


you got my future (in your hands)

by lilythesilly



Category: Schitt's Creek
Genre: David works at a fashion magazine, Patrick is a writer, Rachel is Patrick's Stevie, Slow Burn, Stevie is Stevie, Strangers to Friends to Lovers, assistant!David, assistant!Patrick, just really fuckin' pretty, kind of, never said they were bright guys, oblivious idiots
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-19
Updated: 2020-12-10
Packaged: 2021-03-09 18:08:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 26,578
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27570559
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lilythesilly/pseuds/lilythesilly
Summary: “I’m really glad you stole my boss’s dinner, David.”“Me too.”“And I’m so glad you came up with the plan to set our bosses up, Patrick and given me copious amounts of free time.”“Mm, a bold claim.”__________________Or, the Set it Up AU.
Relationships: Patrick Brewer/David Rose
Comments: 36
Kudos: 102





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I've seen Set it Up like a hundred times (not including the amount of times I had to watch it while I was writing this). That being said, you don't have to have seen it to get this fic - although I really can't recommend it enough.
> 
> This fic is fully written, and I'll post every Thursday until it's finished!
> 
> Many many many thanks to [nontoxic](https://archiveofourown.org/users/nontoxic/pseuds/nontoxic) who beta-ed the eff out of this and was there to cheer me on/scream with me whenever I couldn't wait and filled our chat with random snippets.
> 
> Title from 'Signed, Sealed, Delivered' by Stevie Wonder.

“Patrick I need a copy of my safety deposit box key. I don’t care that it says do not copy – I say _do copy_.” 

\--

“David I left my id at a bar last night but I can’t remember which one. Can you call all the usual spots?” 

\--

“Patrick I need you to go give these Mets tickets to a guy I know and he’s gonna give you two hundred dollars. Don’t look suspicious when you walk away.”

\--

“David they didn’t mix my salad properly I need you to toss it the way I like it.” 

\--

“Patrick what’s my password?”

\--

“David I can’t remember, is it plum or violet that fills me with a blind rage?” 

\--

“Patrick!”

\-- 

“David!”

\--

_“Patrick!”_

\--

_“David!”_

\--

Holy _fuck._

When Wendy says she needs to make a quick stop at _The Coquette_ to meet with one of the managers for their magazine’s upcoming speaker series David jumps at the chance to accompany her in the hopes that he’d either get to walk into the illustrious business club or at least be able to take the car service home. Should be a quick visit, fifteen minutes. Tops. Fifteen minutes is easy, practically nothing.

But it’s been an hour now and that’s a different fucking story.

“Look, Ivan, I understand that only members are allowed inside, but it’s freezing. Can I just stand on the other side of the doorway?” Fuck, that frozen ice palace he rescued Alexis from in Russia might be warmer than where he’s currently standing. 

Ivan doesn’t glance up from the magazine he’s reading, “Other side of doorway is for members only.” 

“Ok but Wendy sponsors non-members here all the time, so I know that’s not true.”

Still glancing at the magazine he says, “You need to be on list.” Page flip. “You are not on list.”

Of course he’s not. David rubs his eyebrow and debates whether or not this is the hill he wants to die on with Ivan. It’s not, so he returns to the sidewalk and tries to imagine that his Helmut Lang mohawk hoodie is warmer than it actually is while he waits for Wendy to finish up her meeting. 

His phone pings and he hopes that it's Wendy saying that she’s ready to leave. But when he checks it’s only Sebastien asking if he’d like to meet up at a club in Chelsea when he’s off. He considers it briefly, but after remembering the cart of mall pretzels that he consumed last year he decides it’s a hard no and swipes the message away. 

Just as he thinks maybe he should just go wait in the car he hears Ivan mutter a, “Good evening Ms. Wendy” and immediately scrambles for the bottle of green juice in his work bag. 

Wendy walks out and flips her fur shawl over her shoulder and glances at David. He hands her the juice and she glances at it for a moment before looking back at him, “I need you to do the thing.”

As she starts drinking the juice David starts on the list, “Think of filet mignon with a red wine reduction. Pork soup dumplings. Next season’s Dior. That couture Chanel gown. Ah...the look on your ex-husband’s face when he sees that you’re thinner and better looking than his next wife.” 

With a grimace she finishes the juice and hands it back to David after he opens the door to the town car, “So I will see you tomorrow?” He asks, flipping through his email for any late night emergencies.

Wendy pauses and quirks her eyebrow in a way that immediately fills David with dread. “Don’t be silly, David. We need to go back to the office. The layout still needs a few tweaks and I’m still not completely sold on the editorial spread.” Well, there goes the Audrey Hepburn double feature he was planning tonight.

“Oh, ok, perfect. Absolutely – would you like me to order you dinner?” He starts pulling up the number for the bistro around the corner from the office when Wendy puts a hand on his shoulder.

“David, I’m on day 5 of a juice cleanse, I’ve already had my dinner.”

David bites his tongue for a moment before deciding he needs to say it. “I know, it’s just that you say that, and then you usually get hungry.”

Wendy is typing away on her phone and flicks him off. “Well I won’t.” 

Just as he’s about to get in the car behind her she slams the door shut and rolls down the window, “On your way back to the office can you get me three more of those highlighters I like? I don’t care about the color, but nothing with a warm undertone. Thanks so much.” 

David watches the car drive away and glances at his phone. If he runs, he can make it to the pen shop before they close in fifteen minutes. Ugh. His Rick Owens high tops were not made for this.  
  


\--  
  


Patrick sighs and tosses the foam basketball into the hoop above his desk. He misses, but the thought of picking it up is not promising. He glances at the clock on his computer and then at his watch to make sure it’s the same time. If Ronnie comes back in the next two minutes he might be able to make his date with just enough time. 

As if someone above has heard and taken pity on him Ronnie walks through the office and breezes by his desk, tossing her fitbit at him. “I need 500 more steps on that to meet my count today. I don’t want to get any flack from Mutt at our session tomorrow.” 

She walks into her office and comes back out, “Brewer are you trying to starve me to death? Where is my dinner? I want that thing from that place I like with the cute owner. Not the one with the bangs, the other one.”

“So we are doing a second dinner then?” Well, there goes his date. Hopefully they’re not already waiting for him at the restaurant. Again. 

Ronnie walks back into her office without a word and ok, yep, conversation over. Patrick puts the fitbit on his wrist and starts jogging around the office while he dials the Café. “Hey Twyla, it’s Patrick. Yeah – she does. Can I get the burger and the truffle mac and cheese with no – yep, that’s it. How soon – oh great, thanks Twy.” 

He hangs up and starts jogging in place while he tries to figure out what to tell Ben. This is the second time this week that he’s had to reschedule their date for work and he’s honestly worried at this point that Ben will straight up just ghost him. It’s only the first date so it wouldn’t be the worst thing in the world, but still. Ben is cute and the first guy in a while that Patrick actually wants to meet in person.

He shoots off a quick message to Ben, telling him he has to work late and he’s really sorry and hoping they can reschedule before putting his phone back in his pocket so he doesn't have to think about it.

“Patrick!”

Patrick jogs over to Ronnie’s office, meeting the step count. He tries to collect himself and wipe the sweat off his forehead before grabbing his notebook and walking in. 

He flips open the notebook and starts reading off the note he jotted down an hour ago. “I heard back from copy and we’re good to post the Derek Jeter interview tomorrow.” He’s still sweating he thinks. When Ronnie flips open her laptop he tries to discreetly wipe his face on his sweater. It’s so hot in this office.

“Great,” she says as she starts typing, “I need to push the overseas basketball story back. Miguel is writing like he works at UsWeekly – can you make a note for me to yell at him in the morning?” 

“Yeah, of course.” As long as she isn’t yelling at him. 

Ronnie starts examining the fitbit he hands her, “Did you return that fur coat I asked you to?” 

Patrick isn’t sure how to answer the question and decides to go for the truth. “Yes, and after a long conversation with the sales associate that left her in tears and me severely nauseous because I made her cry, I was able to get you a full refund.”

“I’d like it back.” 

“You got it.” 

Just as he’s about to leave Ronnie slams her laptop shut, “This site is still in its freshman year, we should have ten times the number of story ideas than we have right now. What is this, amateur hour?” 

Patrick pauses for a moment. He can’t tell if she’s talking to him or herself. It’s usually herself, but Patrick will take it. It’s now or never. “I think – I mean I might have one,” he turns to see Ronnie staring at him. Boredly, but still. He has a bit of her attention so he rolls with it, “I mean, if you want to hear it. It’s not like fleshed out or outlined or anything—“

Ronnie visibly relaxes, “Oh good. You’re telling me it’s bad before you pitch it. Go on.” 

“Well,” he starts and takes a deep breath, “It’s called the gerilympics. It’s sort of like an Olympic games for senior citizens. It’s actually really cool; they have races and ping pong and weight lifting. And what makes it so special is that a lot of them were athletes when they were younger who didn't really get to make it then, but they can now. And yeah, people make fun of it, but it gives them something to _live for_ and –” He pauses and tries to collect himself. If he keeps going at this rate he’s going to –

“Brewer, are you crying?” 

“It’s just that sports make me emotional sometimes because it’s just like - I mean, _they’re so_ – and they can _provide_ , y’know-” His phone starts buzzing in his pocket and he checks it, “Your dinner.” He finishes lamely and wipes his eyes quickly before clearing his throat, “Which I’m going to go get right now.” 

Once he gets in the elevator he checks the message that he sent to Ben and sees that he read it when he sent it twenty minutes ago, but didn’t respond, which. That tracks.  
  


\--  
  


David flips through the negatives from the Austen themed shoot the other day, trying to flag anything that might set Wendy off. He crosses out the shots with the purple gowns because honestly, it’s like no one in this office remembers the Fanta Girl fiasco of 2011. 

His phone pings on his desk and he glances down at it to see another text from Sebastien. Well, it’s the same text from earlier, copied twice. Once he can say no to with no problem. Twice though…

Just as he’s about to respond Wendy comes out of her office and picks up the negatives, “So when is dinner getting here?”

 _Fuck_. He should’ve known better, honestly. “I’m about to go get it right now.” He gets up as slowly as he can, and walks with as much confidence as he can muster until he’s sure he’s out of Wendy’s range. Once he is, he sprints to the elevator. 

Fuck fuck fuck. All of the usual places are closed by now. Maybe if he runs he can catch Twyla before she locks up the Café for the night. 

When the elevator doors open he sees someone else on the ground floor arguing with the delivery guy from the Café. 

“Come on George, you know me, you know I’m good for it. What happened to the Square? I literally used it four hours ago.” The guy pleads. He’s cute, in a repressed accountant kind of way. 

George looks sorry, “It’s not working, man. Cash only.”

The guy looks like he’s edging toward level five panic. “Ok but you’re not understanding me: I used all of my cash on Ronnie’s first dinner, so I only have a card. And if I don’t take this dinner upstairs to her, she’ll kill me.”

“I hear you, I really do. But I need someone to pay for this order.” 

It’s a dick move, even for him, but he’s desperate. “I have cash, George.” David says pulling out his wallet and counting the bills.

Repressed accountant’s life looks like it’s flashing before his eyes as he hands the money over to George. “I’ve been to one too many Central Park shoots to carry anything less than $250 cash on me.” David mentions to him, and then as an afterthought, “Also please don’t rob me. I have mace.” 

George takes the money and hands over the bag and he has no idea what’s in it. But at this point in her juice cleanse, Wendy won’t be particular. “Thanks David,” and then adds to the other guy, “Sorry Patrick.” and leaves.

David turns back to the elevator and the other guy – Patrick – runs after him. “Ok, look. David, it’s David, right? Hi, I’m Patrick. Let me make you a deal.” 

David stops and gives him a once over. “I don’t think you’re in a position to be making deals.” 

“ _Please._ Look – there are two meals in there. Just give me the mac and cheese and you can have the burger.” 

“I’m not giving my boss _just_ a burger.” 

David can see the wheels turning in his head and Patrick grabs the bag, “Ok, here’s what we’re gonna do. We’re just gonna –” He takes the bun off the burger and puts a scoop of mac and cheese on it before putting it back, “there! A mac and cheese gourmet burger.”

David looks at the burger and shrugs. Wendy’s eaten worse. “Fine, you can take the other meal, but I want my money back tomorrow. With interest.”

Now that everything seems settled Patrick’s mouth quirks up a bit, which immediately unsettles David. “I can do that.” 

“You should really carry cash on you.” David adds as he heads towards the opposite elevator. This is New York City; carrying cash should be a prerequisite. 

Patrick leans against the elevator, holding it open. That little quirk has turned into a full-blown smirk. “And you should really order your boss’s dinner before all of the restaurants close.”

David really isn’t enjoying the shift in power of this conversation so he tries to get back on equal footing. “You know for someone who just begged for mac and cheese so he wouldn’t get fired you seem _very_ sure of yourself.”

Patrick laughs. “Threw you a bit of a change up there, I guess.”

“Yeah, I don’t know what that means, I don’t play cricket.” David turns to let the elevator doors close before pulling them back, “Like I said. Tomorrow. Payment in full, plus interest. I’m on 21.”

Patrick grins, “Noted. I’ll see you tomorrow. Goodnight, David.” 

David manages to get out a, “Ciao.” before the doors close and he pauses. Ciao. He just said _ciao_ …to that person.  
  


\--  
  


Patrick makes it back up to the office in time to see Ronnie walking past him into the now open elevator. “I’m gonna be in early tomorrow and I need you in before me.”

“Ok no problem, what time is –” his question gets cut off as the elevator doors close. Great. Well, at least he has dinner now. 

Once he finally gets home Patrick collapses onto his bed and changes into a hoodie and some pajama pants that may or may not have cartoon baseballs on them. Whatever, they were a gift from his mom.

He settles on the couch with his laptop and opens the draft for his article. He watches the cursor blink on the blank document for a few minutes. Taps his fingers on the keys lightly. Starts writing random words in hopes that a sentence will string itself together. Eventually he just opens YouTube. 

He’s crying his way through a highlights video when he hears the lock click on the front door. He looks up at Rachel pitifully as she pops her head into the living room, her boyfriend Andrew right behind her. 

“Oh, Patty.” She sighs and throws herself on the couch next to him. “Are you watching Jeter’s final home game or Dee Gordon’s home run?” 

“Dee Gordon’s home run.” 

She winces and takes the laptop from him. “I take it the date didn’t go well?” 

“It didn’t go at all. I got stuck at work late.” 

Andrew sits down on the chair in front of them. “Oh, dude. I saw that article Ronnie wrote about Dodger fans – it was fucking hilarious. I sent it to like, twenty people. She must be a riot to work for.”

“I know, she’s amazing.”

Rachel pats his arm sympathetically. “Too bad she hates you.” 

“I know.” He needs to stop wallowing. In the grand scheme of things today didn’t even make the Top Ten shittiest days he’s had at work. "And if today wasn't already going badly enough, I ran out of cash because Ronnie wanted a _second_ dinner and the delivery guy's Square chip card thing wasn't working so some guy came out of nowhere and paid for it himself and took it! Like who does that?" 

Rachel hums, "But was he cute?" 

Patrick flushes, "That's not the point." He shoves her when she wiggles her eyebrows suggestively. Whatever. “How was the party?” 

Rachel shrugs. “It was fine. Brock was there.”

 _Oh._ “Is he the one you – you, um,“ There’s no tasteful way to ask this so Patrick pretends to shoot a hoop and makes a finger motion – 

“Rebounded with after you guys broke off your engagement because you’re gay?” Andrew finishes for him. “Yeah, he was.” 

Patrick turns to Rachel. “You told him?” 

Andrew laughs. “No, I figured it out. Do you moonlight as a mime on the weekends? Because those hand gestures were effortless.”

Rachel shrugs. “I tell him everything, Patty.” 

Patrick eyes her carefully. “Everything?”

“ _Everything_.” 

“Including the time we almost got arrested for –”

“Yep.”

“And that time your mom caught us –”

“Uh huh.” 

“What about that trip we took to Montana –”

“Bits and pieces. What the NDA allows us to say anyway.

Andrew laughs and gets up. “I’m gonna grab you some water. Patrick, you want anything? Some marshmallow fluff maybe?” Patrick blushes and waves him off and Andrew disappears. Ok cool. She really _has_ told him everything. 

Rachel watches him go with a moony look on her face. It’s a look he hasn’t seen before. It makes him happy, to see her so happy, after everything. “I love him. Like, so much.”

Patrick snorts and sinks back down with her into the couch. “So do I. Any guy who’s cool with this,” he gestures between them, “gets the seal of approval in my book.” 

Rachel eventually gets up and goes to search for Andrew. Their apartment is pretty small, so he can really only be in one of two places. 

He’s mid search for the highlights from Derek Jeter’s final home game when he hears Rachel scream. He jumps up and sprints into her room. Andrew’s a nice guy, an accountant, he can’t be a murderer, right? 

He gets to her doorway and freezes when he sees Andrew on one knee. He puts the ring on Rachel’s finger and then she jumps on him, knocking both of them to the floor and suddenly Patrick’s thrown back four years to his childhood bedroom, down on one knee too. The Rachel he was looking at then was happy, but the one he’s looking at now is absolutely beaming.

Things were touch and go, for a while after they broke up, especially because Patrick couldn't really explain _why_ they broke up. But once he figured it out they were able to have a conversation, a really _honest_ conversation that still makes Patrick want to shrink in on himself when he thinks about it, and slowly start to rebuild their relationship in a different way. A better way. 

There's always been a small part of him that was worried that because of what he did, how _badly_ he handled their own engagement, that Rachel would never want to have this again. 

But looking at both of them now, something finally loosens in his chest and he lets out a big whoop. Rachel jumps off of Andrew and flies at him, “Oh my _god_ , Patty.” And he hugs her, ecstatic that they’re here, able to celebrate this. Because it’s fucking awesome. 

Andrew comes up behind her and Patrick claps him on the shoulder. “Congratulations, man. Really. I’m so happy for you guys.” Holy shit his best friend is actually getting _married_. “But, just – if you’re gonna have celebration sex could you turn on some music? I have to get a good night’s sleep if I’m gonna read Ronnie’s mind to figure out what time she wants me to come in tomorrow.”

Andrew laughs and Rachel flips him off before closing the door in his face. Once he’s back in his room, he tries to ignore the sound of Bruno Mars and opens Tinder. He swipes left on a couple guys before stopping on one. His name is Ken, he’s 26 too, and he’s wearing a polo that is…really working for him. He swipes right and matches with him. Patrick feels all floaty. Maybe he’s not as bad at this as he thought. He opens the message and goes for his go-to opening line:

_Any sports moments make you cry?  
  
_

\--  
  


David feels a migraine coming on, and all he wants is a glass of wine and a good facemask. 

Wendy has finally left for the night and he glances back at Sebastien’s text from earlier. He’s not desperate enough to text him back two hours later. At least, not right now. He tosses his phone in his bag before he can change his mind. 

When he gets home his apartment is pitch black which means Stevie is either out or asleep. Either one works for him as he drops his bag and heads straight for the fridge. He’s too lazy to grab a glass so he just grabs the bottle of white he opened yesterday and pulls the stopper out. Just as he’s about to take a swig the light flicks on and Stevie’s standing on the other side of the fridge, “Long day?” 

David jumps out of his skin and nearly drops the bottle of wine. “Jesus Christ! You’re like a moth…just lurking and waiting to attack me.”

He follows her into the living room and falls onto the couch. “Why are you even up this late, don’t you have an early morning check in?” Stevie shifts and doesn’t make eye contact. _Oh_. “Unless, we have a guest?”

“Just because I’m up past ten doesn’t mean I was banging someone. What do you think I am, a whore?”

“Absolutely not. You’d never give it away for free.” He dodges the pillow she throws at him and takes a swig from the bottle and passes it to her. “But seriously, don’t you have an early check in at the hotel tomorrow?” 

Stevie shrugs. “I’ll be fine. Wouldn’t be the first time I work the desk with little to no sleep.” She drinks from the bottle as her bedroom door opens and a woman pokes her head out. She kisses Stevie’s cheek and mutters that she’ll call her later before leaving. He guesses Stevie can sense what he’s about to say because she throws another pillow at him. “Ok _yes_ , in this completely isolated instance, we had a guest.” She passes David the bottle. “You’re home late. Fun day?” 

“The _funnest_. A sales girl told Wendy that she was a size 4 instead of a size 2 and I got her fired.” 

Stevie laughs. “Just think, one day, you’ll be a boss of your own. Making people cry and firing them because they recommended a blouse that was the wrong shade of red.” 

David sniffs and grabs the bottle from her. “And if today wasn’t stressful enough I met this guy who not only tried to steal Wendy’s dinner, but tried to tell me how to do my job! As if just anyone could find three dozen swans and a berry known only to be grown in Brazil for a shoot at the last minute.”

Stevie makes a noise of approval and pulls a joint out of her pocket. “Well, one of the maids found this in a room today and brought it to me as contraband. So, do you wanna relax before bed?” 

David eyes it warily. “That’s disgusting. But also, yes.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm on Tumblr, come say [hi](https://lilythesilly.tumblr.com)!


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _“So why were you here so late? Are you like a janitor or something?”_
> 
> _Patrick laughs. “What, do I look like a janitor?”_
> 
> _David turns and gives him a once over before pursing his lips, “I don’t think you want me to answer that.” ___

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy American Thanksgiving to those who are celebrating! Regardless of the day, I am infinitely thankful for this little show that led me to this fandom.

\--

The 21st floor looks like something out of a noir film. Everything seems so poised and intentional and…sad?...that Patrick immediately feels out of place when he steps out of the elevators. 

He manages to dodge a few moving clothing racks and… he wants to say mannequins, but they might actually just be people waiting in the lobby. He walks up to the giant white donut up front and approaches the receptionist behind the desk, “Um, excuse me — ” 

“Sleek Magazine how can I direct your call?” she responds like she’d rather be anywhere else. When she realizes he isn’t on the phone she raises her eyes from the magazine she’s flipping through and looks at him boredly, “Can I help you?”

“Um, yes – I’m looking for David Rose, can you point me towards his desk?” 

The girl has gone back to flipping through the magazine and flicks her hand in the general direction of the floor. “Last I saw him he was stress sorting Valentino in the Closet, so.” She doesn’t finish the sentence and is apparently done with the conversation, so he heads off in the general direction she pointed to. 

After the third person tells him, “ _Accounting is actually on 24_ ,” he manages to find David in what he assumes is the world’s largest closet. David is muttering to himself while he flicks through a clothing rack. 

“Incorrect… incorrect… absolutely not… usable, I guess,” he pauses like he senses someone in the room and continues, “I swear to god, Alicia if you bring me one more chartreuse blouse, I’m gonna leave it in and let Wendy kill you herself.” 

Patrick grins and leans into it, “Chartreuse is green right?” 

“It’s disgusting is what it is.” David stops and steps through the rack. “Patrick, right? The one who stole my dinner?” 

Patrick can’t help the inherent desire to tease that bubbles up in his chest. “Technically it was my dinner first.” 

David cocks an eyebrow and wow, his face is beautiful. Even when it’s unimpressed. “So do you have my money or not?” 

Patrick smiles and hands over the money. “Plus interest.” 

David looks like he wants to smile but settles on tucking it into the corner of his mouth instead. “Thank you.” He murmurs and returns to the rack. Patrick feels like he’s being dismissed so he turns to leave when David speaks up again, “So why were you here so late? Are you like a janitor or something?” 

Patrick laughs. “What, do I look like a janitor?” 

David turns and gives him a once over before pursing his lips, “I don’t think you want me to answer that.” 

Patrick doesn’t know what to do under his gaze so he ploughs through, “Anyways, no. I am not a janitor. I work for Ronnie. Lee.” Her name hasn’t registered on David’s face so he keeps going, “Former ESPN reporter?” 

“Ok?” David moves past him and walks over to the wall to start pulling belts and Patrick follows.

“You really don’t know? She - I mean she broke the Penguins concussion protocol story that literally _changed_ the NHL—” 

“Again, I don’t play cricket so that means nothing to me.” He’s choosing between two belts that look exactly the same so Patrick grabs one. David makes an offended noise before taking another look at it and grabbing it back. “You speak so highly of her now, but you made her sound like a real monster last night to George.” 

Patrick can feel his ears turning pink. “She’s not that bad. She can just be… a lot when she’s stressed. And she has every right to be stressed, she’s like a one woman reporting powerhouse.” David is looking at him skeptically and he feels like he’s been caught. “She also doesn’t like me all that much.”

David starts nodding and trying to contain his laughter, “And there it is.” 

Patrick can feel the blush going down his neck and bordering on a full fluster. “There what is? There’s nothing there.” Yeah, ok and now he’s full on flustered. “Yeah, well it doesn’t seem like your boss likes you very much either. You were here just as late as I was.” 

David hums. “Later, I think.” He flicks it off, “Plus, I don’t need Wendy to like me. I just need her to promote me, and she can be very difficult. She’s like if a piranha had a baby with a coked out supermodel from the 70s. And that baby had low blood sugar and hadn’t had sex in a year.”

Patrick makes a face. “Did you just use the words baby and sex in the same sentence?”

David bites his lip and shakes his head, “Yeah, no, I heard it as soon as I said it.”

Patrick laughs and leans on the rack. “Is that why you’re always here late?” 

David shoos him off the rack and pulls him out of the closet towards the kitchen. “Sometimes. Mostly it’s because I can’t leave until she leaves.” 

Patrick gets it. “Ronnie never leaves. She even keeps a cot in her office.” 

David nods. “Wendy has a Tempur-Pedic cot in her office. It’s like, the McQueen of cots.” 

Patrick huffs a laugh. “I’ll take your word for it.” 

David opens a jar of pretzels and offers some to Patrick, “They’re not mall pretzels, but they’ll do.” Patrick takes a couple and David watches him for a moment, like he’s trying to figure something out before he asks, “So if your boss hates you, why work for her?”

“She doesn’t hate me,” he defends, “she just isn’t as fond of me as she is of other people. Which is fine. The work she’s done, the stories she’s broken — I mean, screw ESPN, the whole professional sports world is different because of her. She could spill hot coffee on me and I’d thank her. I’d kill to be her when I grow up.” 

“You are grown up,” David says.

Patrick frowns, “I am not. Take it back.” He goes to grab a few more pretzels and David pulls the jar out of his reach for a second before putting it back down in front of him. “Ugh, I would do anything to have an article on her site one day. I have an idea in the works – about Olympic games for senior citizens – but, I don’t know. It’s not really anything yet.” 

David hums, “Sounds interesting.” he says and glances back down at his phone and frowns, “Ew, would you look at this?” He shows his phone to Patrick who sees a photo of a bunch of Instagram models lounging by a pool, “My sister and her influencer friends are always doing these ridiculous pool parties. I’m kind of jealous, actually. It’s been ages since someone’s asked me to refill a bowl of molly at a party.” 

Patrick doesn’t really know what to do with that so he says, “Oh yeah. I haven’t really been to a party in a while either — it feels like I miss everything. I mean, I haven’t made out with anyone in a really long time. Like I’m sure if I made out with someone right now, my tongue wouldn’t know what to do.” 

David raises his eyebrow and Patrick blushes. “Is this you offering?” 

Patrick’s stomach does a little flip, but David is teasing him so he ignores it, “Thinking about my life – or lack thereof – is crazy sometimes. I mean, when my mom was my age, she had _me_. And I haven’t even had a boyfriend.” 

David ears perk up he leans forward against the counter to look at Patrick, “You’ve never had a boyfriend? Like not even a secret summer camp one?” 

Patrick shrugs and grabs more pretzels, “I’m newly gay. Well, newly realized gay. I’ve only been out for a year or so. Like my last serious relationship was with a woman. Who I was engaged to. Who’s now my roommate.” 

David blinks and takes a step back, “My god,” he purses his lips and Patrick does not look at them, he really doesn’t, “Please tell me that’s in your Tinder bio. Because those are great selling points.” 

Patrick laughs and then internally cries a bit at how pathetically lonely that sounds. “I’m gonna end up like Ronnie,” he whines. “I’m gonna end up alone, buying fur coats and having sex with my computer.”

David laughs. “I don’t know that you can pull off a fur coat — but that’s why she’s probably so mean. She needs to stop having sex with her computer and get laid.”

Patrick shakes his head, “She doesn’t need to ‘get laid.’ She needs to be cherished and made love to.” 

David makes a face, “Ew.” He pauses and checks his phone when it pings, “Wendy needs to get laid. An intern mentioned her ex-husband this morning and she fired her on the spot.” 

Patrick laughs, “Since they’re always here so late we should just lock them in a room to have sex with each other.” David huffs a laugh out so he keeps going, “Yeah — we can totally just Cyrano them out of the office. And while they’re having _alone time_ , we’re free.” 

David hums, “Well again, I don’t need to be free, I need to be promoted.” 

Patrick shrugs, “Look, all I care about is that I’m not an assistant when I’m 28. Because that’s when things start to get really dark.” He laughs.

David glares at him, “I’m 28.” 

Patrick’s trying not to laugh as hard as he wants to, “I’m sorry,” He says as solemnly as he can. But because the need to tease David a bit is itching inside his brain he adds, “For you. That’s—”

David huffs and waves his arms, “Ok, I think you need to go.” 

Patrick grins and pulls out his wallet, handing David his business card. “Well, if you ever want to Cyrano our bosses, just give me a call — and I think you’re gonna want to.” He feels more of that teasing energy bubbling underneath his skin so he grabs a few more pretzels from the jar David is holding, “I’m just gonna grab some more of these, thanks.” and leaves the kitchen. 

\-- 

David is halfway through a joint and Pretty Woman when the idea hits him. He falls out of bed as he grabs his phone and Patrick’s business card and dials his number, “Hi David, it’s Patrick,” he says when the call goes to voicemail and fuck, that’s not right is it? “I was just calling to talk about the Cy...the — that thing, idea you were talking about earlier. So just call me back and I would be happy to walk you through my idea. Ok, ciao...” Ciao. He just said ciao. To him. Again. 

David’s brain is swimming, but even he knows that message was misleading at best, so he redials Patrick’s number to leave another message, “Hi _Patrick_. Yeah, I think I called you David,” he laughs nervously, “Um, which that’s not your name, so you can just delete that text — call — um, message. Just wanted to say, that I liked the Cy— the, that idea that you had earlier. But like, if I were to get involved we’d have to do some heavy planning. And you’d have to give me full creative control. I’m talking meet-cutes, romantic gestures - the full romcom,” He gets distracted on screen as Richard Gere presents Julia Roberts with a necklace and snaps it closed on her hand. He’s laughing so hard he doesn’t realize he’s hung up. 

He redials. “Sorry we got cut off — Richard Gere was giving Julia the necklace and well, you know the scene.” 

\--

The next morning when David wakes up he checks his call log to see he called Patrick six times last night. Fuck. 

Even if the directory hadn’t told him that the magazine Patrick worked for was on the 8th floor, he would know he was here. It’s a very open space… assumingly to promote collaboration or team unity or whatever and it’s covered in what he can guess are sports posters — there are a lot with people holding sticks. 

Since the office is pretty small and open he can see Patrick sitting at a desk in the back. He starts to make his way over when two people leave the office across. Well, a woman — who he can only assume is Ronnie by the way Patrick’s described her — leaves, and a man storms out after her. 

Patrick looks practically gleeful when David approaches his desk. “We’re doing a story on Friday about the NCAA not paying college athletes and some of the coaches aren’t happy with the advanced copies they got,” Patrick says in greeting, “That guy,” he points to the man who just followed Ronnie out of the office, “Made 8 million last year and his star player lives in his car. He’s really not a fan of Ronnie’s article. It’s amazing.” He’s grinning as he watches Ronnie and that guy argue by the elevators. 

David looks down and frowns at Patrick’s desk, “What… are those?” He points at the red thimble things Patrick is wearing on his fingers.

Patrick’s lips quirk. “I like to wear them when I edit, they help me flip the pages faster.” 

David seriously doubts that. Before he can lose his nerve he says, “So um, I just wanted to come by and talk about that idea that you had. Um, yesterday.” 

“Oh, ok.” Patrick bites his lip and looks like he’s trying not to laugh at him, and it should really bother David more than it does. 

“What?” 

Patrick bites his lip a little harder for a moment and pulls something up on his computer. “Nothing, I’m just—” he lets himself laugh a little bit, “really glad that you made such good use of my business card. I’m sorry I didn’t answer, I was doing something. I also had to look up that Richard Gere scene you were talking about—”

Wait. “You’ve never seen Pretty Woman?” 

Patrick looks up at him and blinks. “Is that a problem?” 

“It might be.” 

Patrick laughs and turns his screen to show David some sort of complicated spreadsheet. “This is what I was working on last night.” He must see the look on David’s face because he keeps going, “It’s everything that I know about Ronnie. What she likes, what she hates—”

“You mean other than you?”

“Ha ha,” Patrick rolls his eyes and goes back to the spreadsheet, “This is how we set them up! We know literally everything about them. Like, what’s Wendy’s favorite food?” 

“The filet from Jon Pierre,” the answer automatically flies out of his mouth. 

“Where will she be at 4pm today?” 

“Getting her weekly seaweed body wrap.” 

“What does she hate?” 

“People who use the word ‘brekkie’ unironically or wear culottes.” 

“See! We know literally everything about them. We control their schedule, their entire lives — we’re the men behind the curtain!” 

David is leaning over Patrick’s desk, “This spreadsheet is very thorough. But we have to be discreet. If Wendy ever finds out she’ll fire me—” 

Patrick turns to him, “No one will find out.”

David isn’t convinced, “Ok you say that now, but something about this feels like tempting fate and I really can’t afford to be fired.”

Patrick puts his hands on his shoulders, “David, I know we don’t know each other well, but you can trust me. I promise. No one is gonna find out.”

David pauses for a moment and weighs his options. He needs to get promoted. If Wendy is out of the office all of the time, she’ll have to give him more responsibility and then she’ll see he’s definitely overqualified for his current job and then she'll have to promote him — hopefully. “Ok, fine. But I’ll only do it if—”

“You get creative control, I know.” Patrick laughs, “Why don’t we meet at the coffee kiosk downstairs later and figure out how they’re going to meet.” 

“The coffee at the kiosk is disgusting, don’t ever go there,” David waves him off, “Besides. I already know how they’re going to meet. It’s obvious.” Patrick still looks lost so David has to elaborate, “The elevator?” 

“The elevator? How are we going to get them to meet in the elevator?” Patrick asks. 

David tilts his head and stares at him, “Have you not met Bob?” 

\-- 

It turns out Bob is the maintenance guy for the building. Patrick meets David the next night at his office. 

“So, how do you know Bob?” He asks David before they go inside. 

David shrugs, “When your boss throws furniture like mine does, you get to know the guys in maintenance.” 

Bob’s office is… creepy. There are no windows so the only source of light is coming from a lamp in the corner and the computer screens on the desk. The floor is dry but somehow also looks wet and Patrick tries his best not to touch anything. 

“Oh wow, a bagel, thanks David.” Bob says when David hands him a bag, “Now what can I do for ya? Wendy break another bookcase?” 

“Not today,” David says and hands Bob a piece of paper. “But um, we were hoping to shut down the elevator for a few minutes so two people could...fall in love.” 

“Y’know Gwen and I met in an elevator.” Bob says sadly. 

“Who’s—” Patrick starts to ask but David puts a hand on his shoulder and when he looks over David just shakes his head and mouths ‘don’t,’ so he drops it. 

“It would be a really big favor, Bob.” David says instead.

“Well, the only thing I love more than people meeting in elevators are bagels and you already brought me one of those so,” he turns back to the monitors and turns them on, “I’d be happy to help.”

Once Wendy is in the elevator they watch until Ronnie rounds the corner on the security cam, “Ok Bob open the door here,” Patrick says and Ronnie walks into the open elevator. 

Ronnie glances at Wendy who’s staring at her phone so she presses the elevator door close and they stare at the doors silently. “What, do people just not say hello anymore?” 

David rubs his eyebrow in a soothing motion, like a force of habit. “Ugh, this is nothing like _How to Succeed in Business_.” 

They watch them stand in awkward silence until the elevator stops again and someone else gets inside. Patrick gets closer to the screen and squints, because that looks like—

“What the fuck is Roland doing here?” David practically shouts. His voice keeps getting higher and higher. “He never delivers anything this late.” 

Patrick watches his — and apparently David’s — least favorite UPS guy stand between Ronnie and Wendy, leaning on the dolly. 

Bob leans closer to the screen, “Are you guys thinking what I’m thinking?” 

“Call it off,” both Patrick and David say at the same time.

“Let’s go,” Bob says instead and stops the elevators. Patrick freezes and doesn’t know what to do so he just grabs David’s arm because he’s older and wiser and maybe he knows what to do. He looks over and David looks equally as frozen. Bob turns to them and laughs, “That’s what you guys said right?” 

“Turn it back on, turn it back on, turn it back on,” David is insisting, flicking at Bob’s arm until he resumes the elevator. 

Since it’s only a camera they can’t hear anything going on inside the elevator, but by the looks of it Ronnie and Wendy aren’t getting along.

The elevator stops again. 

“Ok, I think we’re done with stopping the elevator, but thank you Bob,” Patrick says, but Bob is messing with the keyboard and suddenly he feels very panicked.

“Oh, hah. Would you look at that, I think the system actually malfunctioned,” Bob laughs and leans back in his chair, and David and Patrick look at each other. “This has literally never happened before. That’s irony for ya.” 

Oh, fuck. 

They look back at the screen and Wendy looks like she’s going to faint. Ronnie is rubbing her temple like she has a migraine coming on (which means tomorrow will be super fun for Patrick, his mind supplies sarcastically) and Roland—

Roland is taking his clothes off. 

Wendy and Ronnie start arguing loudly while gesturing at Roland, and Patrick can’t look because it looks like Roland is taking off his underwear and starts peeing into one of the boxes. 

“Ew. Ew. Ewwwwww.” David is chanting and Patrick has to agree. 

Everything eventually goes back online and Ronnie and Wendy literally sprint out of the elevator when the doors open. 

“Well that was a success!” Bob says seriously.

“Are you kidding me?” David’s voice is getting high again. “That was a disaster. They _clearly_ hate each other.” 

“Hate isn’t that bad. Hate we can work with.” Patrick pauses and gives David a hopeful grin. He doesn’t look impressed. “I think it’s time to enact Plan B.”

“Which is? I didn’t have this on my moodboard.” 

Patrick leans back against the desk and smirks, “What are Wendy’s Yankees tickets like?” 

\-- 

The next day when Patrick brings Ronnie her coffee and gives her the schedule for the day he comments off handedly, “Also, the woman you were stuck in the elevator with yesterday — the editor from the fashion magazine — asked security for your number,” he glances down and pretends to cross something off in his notebook to give Ronnie time to sink into the comment, “but don’t worry, I told them we don’t give it out.” 

\-- 

“So, I heard you got stuck in the elevator with that editor from the sports magazine, Ronnie—” David tries to say casually as she scans her note from the editor.

“Lee!” Wendy finishes for him, “Yes! I’ve seen her at The Coquette a few times. I knew I recognized her.”

“Ronnie Lee, yeah, yep. Y’know, I heard she got Gisele to be a part of their feature on Tom Brady next month.” 

\--

Patrick sprints out of the Yankees team store to see David waiting on the sidewalk, looking very unimpressed. “David, hi! Sorry!” He calls before he makes it over to him. “I’m really sorry. I got here early so I thought I had time to dick around in the team store but then I lost track of time and now I’m late.” 

“You don’t have to explain yourself to me.” He says as he messes with the sleeve of his jacket.

Now Patrick feels bad. “Well, no, I think I do—” 

“I know,” David interrupts, mouth quirking up a bit so Patrick knows he isn’t actually mad, “that’s just what I’m _supposed_ to say.” 

Patrick laughs. “Well, still, I over-dicked it. I’m sorry.”

David shrugs it off, “Apology accepted.” 

He turns to walk towards the stadium but not before Patrick stops him. Because he can’t just not say anything. “Wait. What are you wearing?” 

“A look for the baseball. What are _you_ wearing?” he throws back. 

“Who wears all black and a leather jacket to a baseball game in June?” 

“This is Rick Owens. You’re wearing a striped nightshirt, so what exactly are we doing here?”

“This is a jersey, David.”

“Are you playing for the team? Why would you wear a jersey if you’re not playing in the game?”

“Ok, let’s just go before we’re late.” 

Once they’re inside Patrick waves down Ray while David wanders over to buy a hotdog. “Ray, I need the people in these two seats,” he hands over the slip of paper with Ronnie and Wendy’s seat numbers on them, “to make out.” 

“What do they look like?” he asks. 

“One is a dauntingly striking woman with buzzed hair and a demeanor that is both terrifying and impressive,” He describes Ronnie and searches for words to describe Wendy, “...the other is blonde.” Is what he settles on. 

“Anything for you Patrick,” Ray grins and heads off.

Once he and David find their seats Patrick hands him his pair of binoculars, “Ok, so Wendy is over there,” he points to the third baseline, “right above the ‘U.’”

David grimaces and hands them back. “Are seats up this high even legal?” he complains, “We should’ve just used my family’s box, it’s somewhere over there,” David waves in the general direction of the suites. 

Patrick stops and stares at him, “I’m sorry your family has a _suite_ at Yankee stadium?"

David nods as he eats his hotdog, “Technically my father’s company does, but, well, our name is on the company, so,” he says with his mouth full.

Patrick stops and thinks. It wouldn’t be David’s name per se, but Rose. _Rose_. Wait — “I’m sorry,” he says again and turns to stare at him, “Rose. Like _Rose Video_?” 

“That same one.” David says and finishes his hotdog. 

“Aren’t you guys like billionaires? Why are you working as some lowly assistant when you could probably own your own magazine?” Patrick asks. 

David shrugs and sinks a bit lower in his seat, “My father is a billionaire,” he says stiffly, like it’s a sore topic for him and Patrick immediately feels bad for bringing it up. “He, um. I’ve had... problems in the past. With having my parents use their connections to try to boost my career. I mean, I get a trust fund when I turn 30, so it’s not like I’m completely slumming it. But, until that happens I told them I wanted to make my own way, with my career and my life. Like really earn everything.” He laughs lightly. “It’s the first time I think my dad’s actually ever been proud of me.” 

Patrick can see how uncomfortable David is now so he tries to change the subject, “Well, don’t tell your father, but these are actually the best seats in the stadium,” he says quietly to him and David laughs. “No, it really is! There’s a community up here and you can see the whole field and there’s — there’s Gina!” 

“Hey, Pat!” Gina turns around in her seat next to her husband to wave.

“Gina is the one who told me about the gerilympics,” he tells David, “She’s a heavy weightlifting champ...” 

“What does she lift?” David looks unimpressed. “Styrofoam?” 

“I heard that, you James Dean wannabe,” she says to David, and Patrick can’t help the snort he makes. “I’m old, not deaf.” She turns to Patrick, “Is this your boyfriend?” 

Patrick shakes his head, “Absolutely not, Gina,” he says solemnly, “I would never do that to you.” 

David rolls his eyes and turns back to the game. But because Patrick can’t help himself, he turns to David and says, “You know, my first job in high school was at a Rose Video.”

David gives him a dark look, “And yet you’ve never seen Pretty Woman?” 

The Yankees are up by two when Patrick notices Ronnie finally heading to her seat. David must notice too because he cheers and grabs the binoculars from Patrick’s hands.

Ronnie and Wendy chat for a bit before Ronnie gets up and moves down to take the empty seat next to Wendy. Patrick raises his hand and David meets it in a high five. 

Once they break for the fifth inning Patrick notices the graphic for the Kiss Cam come up on the jumbotron, “Ok, here we go!” he cheers and grabs his popcorn.

The cam comes up on Ronnie and Wendy, who pass, so the camera moves on. 

David sighs next to him and angrily eats some nachos, “Well, this is going horribly.”

It goes around to a few other people who all enthusiastically kiss before coming back around to Ronnie and Wendy and the stadium starts cheering trying to get them to kiss. 

Wendy leans over and kisses Ronnie on the cheek in a ‘ha ha see we did it’ motion and Patrick boos and throws some popcorn in the direction of the jumbotron. A couple people turn to give him dirty looks, “What no I’m not booing _them_ ,” he defends, because _honestly_ , “I just want them to make out!” And then they give him dirtier looks, “No, ew! _Not like that_!”

David’s hand comes up to rub his shoulder and he relaxes back into his seat, “Ok, calm down. I’m just gonna take this from you,” and just straight up steals Patrick’s popcorn. 

He moodily watches David eat his popcorn as the kiss cam starts winding down and then before it ends it comes back to Ronnie and Wendy one last time. Patrick cheers and decides he needs to send Ray a fruit basket or something.

Maybe it’s fate. Maybe it’s attraction. Maybe it’s the sound of thirty thousand people chanting, “kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss!” at them. But Ronnie finally laughs and rolls her eyes and leans in and kisses Wendy. 

The whole stadium erupts in cheers like the Yankees just won the World Series. Patrick and David both jump up and Patrick yells, “Boom baby!” before their hands meet in another high five. 

\-- 

David approaches Patrick’s desk the next day a little after four, “Oh my god, Patrick,” Patrick looks up from where he’s packing up backpack, “Wendy just went home.” 

Patrick grins, “Ronnie went home early today, too,” and offers up another high five. Apparently that’s their thing now? 

Once Patrick has finished shutting down they head over to the elevator. “So, what are your plans with your first day of freedom?” Patrick asks once they get inside.

“There’s an Isabelle Huppert double feature at the movie theater by my apartment, so I might end up there. What do you have planned?” Patrick has this bouncy energy about him and David can’t pin it down.

Patrick grins, “I have a date tonight.”

David stops and turns to him, “Oh, I’m sorry _excusez moi_ ,” he shimmies a bit for effect, “and who are you going on this date with?” 

Patrick goes through his phone and shows him a Tinder profile. _Ken_. How cute. And he doesn’t mean it as sarcastically as it came out, “I’m sorry, I can’t see anything over how tight his polo is.” He hands Patrick back his phone, “So where are you and this Polo Guy going tonight?” 

Patrick grins, “We’re going mini golfing.”

“Ew, why?”

Patrick laughs, “Because it’s fun! And casual. It’s a nice, relaxed environment to get to know someone in,” he defends as they walk out of the elevator, “Actually — I was hoping you could help me.” He steers David over to one of the couches in the lobby and opens his backpack up, pulling a sweater and a shirt out of his backpack. “I was thinking about one of these, but I have no idea. And you work in fashion and,” he gestures to David, “you obviously know how to dress. So I was hoping you could tell me what to wear?” And, he’s not wrong. So David grabs both options and lays them on the couch.

“Ok, first of all, transporting clothes in a backpack and not a temperature-controlled garment bag is incorrect,” he says and stares at them. One is a navy crew neck sweater and the other one is a printed button up with some questionable sleeves. He picks up the sweater, “I would go with this one, it’s much more you.” Patrick smiles and takes it and David makes a face when he hands him the shirt, “and I would burn this. Go long, go short — but this weird sleeve length will do absolutely nothing for your arms so you should get rid of it.” 

Patrick laughs and takes the shirt from him, “Thank you, David. I’ll see you later.” 

As he’s walking away David calls after him, “Make sure you let him win a few holes. Your competitive side is not someone he needs to meet on a first date.” 

Patrick turns and smirks at David, “Excuse me sir, I only have one hole.” 

David’s brain should short-circuit but it doesn’t because he’s focusing on not collapsing on the floor with laughter. He allows himself a smirk and looks at Patrick, “I meant at the golf.” And David does actually let himself laugh when Patrick turns bright red. 

“No th-that’s what I meant too,” he mumbles, “Whatever. I’ll see you later David.” 

A few hours later David is uncorking a bottle of red when Stevie leaps up on the counter, “You’re home early,” she says lightly and grabs two glasses from the cupboard, “did you finally quit?” 

David pours a glass and makes a face at her, “No. I got off early. Because Wendy went home early. Because mine and Patrick’s plan _worked_.” 

Stevie sips her wine and eyes him, “Hm. Patrick, huh? This the guy who took you to a baseball game?”

“Ok first of all, he didn’t _take_ me to a baseball game. We _went_ to a baseball game, because of the set up plan.” He doesn’t like the look she’s giving him so he moves into the living room. 

“Oh,” she says lightly, “and where is Patrick tonight?”

David waves his hand and sinks into the couch, “He’s on some Tinder date. With a guy who gets his polo shirts from the child’s uniform section at Target.” 

“Oh,” she says again and David is starting to hate her tone, “I see. And are you jealous?” 

“Jealous, no, why would I be jealous?” he asks and tries to finish his wine, “Patrick and I are friends.” 

“Oh, ok.” Stevie says and sits on the couch next to him. She flips around so she’s looking and him and has the audacity to fucking grin, “I like this for you.” 

“Like what for me? There’s nothing to like.” He says and Stevie says nothing and just sips her wine. Whatever. “Ugh, I’m going to get more wine.”

\--

“Yeah, so I don’t have like the greatest health insurance plan — but I did see Gronk wasted at a Christmas party once.” Patrick tells Polo Guy as they walk to the next hole. 

“You honestly have the perfect job,” he says and Patrick only preens a little.

“Well, Ronnie does, but still — thank you.” He smiles and sets his golf ball on the ground. 

“I _love_ Ronnie Lee. I can’t believe you get to work for her. What’s she like?” Polo Guy asks, leaning forward on his golf club. 

“She’s… um. She’s great. She’s intelligent and hard working and inspiring, and—” before he can go off on a tangent Patrick turns to the golf ball and tries to hit it lightly so he intentionally misses it. “ _Oh no_ ,” he says as convincingly as he can. 

Polo Guy is laughing at him, “Are you trying to soothe my ego?”

Patrick grins sheepishly. “No,” he defends, “I’ve just been told that I can get a bit… competitive.” 

Polo Guy grins, “Well a little competition never hurt anybody right?” 

Patrick smiles and goes to grab his golf ball. “I’m glad you said that because now I’m not gonna feel bad when I kick your ass.” 

\--

Over the next few weeks Patrick and David field gifts, messages and calls for their bosses who leave the office at three every day and Patrick thinks he may be winning.

And then he has sex for the first time in seven months and then he’s definitely winning. It really can’t get any better. 

And then it does because Rachel asks him to be her Man of Honor and he only cries a little bit. Well, ok. A lotta bit. 

Things have been going so well that he and David decide to go for a celebration dinner one day after work. So of course they end up at the cafe. 

Patrick clinks his glass against David’s, “One month of peace. Congratulations, man.”

David grins, “Congratulations to you.” He takes a sip of his wine, “Wendy let me pick the photos for the feature spread this afternoon because she and I quote, ‘trusts me.’” 

“That’s _amazing_ , David,” he says, because it really is. “But I think we need to take it just a step further now.”

Twyla comes by with the tray of mozzarella sticks they were making fun of earlier. “I heard you guys wanted mozzarella sticks, and who am I to deny my favorite customers.” She grins and places it down in front of them. 

“Wow,” David gapes at the plate. 

“Look at those,” Patrick says and watches the one he picks up completely fall apart. 

“What do you mean, take it a step further?” David asks once Twyla leaves. 

“Rachel’s engagement party is next week, and I have to be there,” he says, “So I thought maybe Wendy could take Ronnie on a trip? Like a weekend getaway?” 

“Why do I feel like you already have something planned?” David asks as he goes for another mozzarella stick. 

“Because I do,” he grins. “There is a wine festival in Nantucket next weekend. And we’re gonna plan the whole thing and let them think it was their idea. Which means they’ll be on an island, with no cell service and we get an entire weekend to ourselves.”

David agrees. “Mhm, yes, ok. I like this plan.” 

Patrick’s phone pings and he looks down and laughs at the meme Polo Guy just sent him. He starts to type ‘hahahahaha’ when David puts a hand on his arm, “Ok. You might want to go easy on the ‘ha ha’s’, you aren’t a psychotic clown. And I would know, I was in a relationship with one for several months and he painted my face every night while I slept.”

“What’s wrong with laughing at his jokes?” Patrick asks. “It shows I’m interested!” 

“Ok, if you’re really as into Polo Guy as you say you are, you need to go out with three more guys this week.” David says and grabs his phone to delete the text.

Patrick grabs his phone back, “Why would I do that?”

David looks unimpressed, “Because. Let’s say you have three sweaters that you really love. If you cycle through them an equal amount and treat them with equal care, you can keep them virtually forever, or at least until they’re out of season. But if you only have one sweater that you wear all the time, like every day, the material starts to wear thin and snags and suddenly you can’t wear it anymore because there’s a giant hole in it.” He leans back in his seat and takes a sip of wine, “People are kind of like that, in my experience.” 

Patrick laughs lightly and leans forward props his chin on his hand, “You’re so wise, David. I’m gonna learn so much from you. Can you be my Queer Yoda — my Quoda?” 

David makes a disgusted noise. “Not if you call it that. Absolutely not.”

Patrick laughs, “Well I like my one sweater, thanks.” He signals for the check from Twyla, “Now let’s get out of here.” 

As they’re paying Patrick’s phone starts buzzing on the table violently. His throat closes up when he sees it’s Ronnie calling him. David sits up all of a sudden and starts texting furiously on his phone. Oh no.

Patrick picks up the call. “H...hello?” he says, trying to keep his voice steady. 

“Brewer, where the hell are you? You better be out getting my dinner.” Ronnie barks on the other side.

Patrick practically drops his phone and scrambles to pick it up, “Yeah. Yes, I am. Um, I’ll be back in like twenty minutes.” 

“Good. And be prepared to stay all night,” she says, and before he can respond, she hangs up. Great. 

He looks over at David who is stress eating the rest of the mozzarella sticks on the plate. He shows Patrick his phone with the dozens of texts that Wendy has sent him in the past minute.

Patrick drops down and slams his head on the table. They were so close. “Twyla,” he calls, “We’re gonna need two usuals to go please.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm on Tumblr, come say [hi](https://lilythesilly.tumblr.com)!


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _They settle into a rhythm after that. Patrick’s other hand lands on David’s shoulder and David’s hand settles on Patrick’s waist. Patrick doesn’t know if it’s because he’s really drunk, or if it’s because David feels solid and warm underneath his hands, but Patrick feels like he’s on a cloud. He has to physically fight the urge to lay his head down onto David's shoulder, in the space that connects with his neck (which Patrick is not thinking about). Because they’re friends, and friends don’t do that. He thinks._
> 
> _Well, ok. Maybe friends can do that. He lets his head fall slowly into that space and for the first time in a really long time, maybe ever, Patrick feels right. David doesn’t shrug him off, so maybe he was right. Friends can dance like this. ___

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here we are– the penultimate chapter! Today is my birthday and the only gift I wanted was to share this with you all, because this chapter is my absolute favorite (ok maybe I also wanted a few things off my book list lol, but still!).

David takes two more aspirin and fights the urge to slam his head down on his desk. In her office behind him, Wendy has moved on from pushing down her bookshelves to trying to throw her chair through her window. 

After he hears what he assumes to be her Condé Nast Woman of the Year Award shatter against the wall, he takes a deep breath and decides to brave the storm. 

Wherever he is right now, a small part of him hopes Patrick is doing just as badly.

He catches Wendy mid-rant when he enters, “—and another thing! Why on earth do I have so much paper in this office! This is the 21st century, why isn’t The Book digital? Why do I have these giant fucking binders everywhere!” 

“Um, we tried that but then you said you didn’t trust that Anna Wintour wouldn’t hack it and steal our cover spreads so we needed to keep a physical copy,” he says and edges towards the corner of the room to start picking up the pieces of —yep, he was right— the Woman of the Year Award. 

When Wendy goes to pick up another chair, he reminds her that the windows in the building are made of acrylic plexiglass and therefore won’t break, so she settles on angrily looking through some photo spreads. 

Once he’s moved on to putting books back on her bookshelf he glances over his shoulder at Wendy and quickly looks back when her head snaps up.

“Let me ask you a question,” she asks calmly and her mood has flipped so drastically in two seconds that David has to hold onto his book with both hands to avoid fidgeting, “if you went to a restaurant and were presented with raw steak, you would assume it was tartare, yes?” 

“What restaurant did you go to?” he asks, and quickly adds, “But also yes.”

“It was Gaonnuri, Ronnie picked it,” she waves off.

He pauses. “But that’s a Korean barbeque place? It–it’s supposed to be raw —like you’re supposed to cook it on your own—”

“Yes, I know that now, obviously. Are you not, listening David?” 

“No I— yes, continue.”

“So you assume this is tartare, correct, so you eat it—”

“Yes.” 

“And then when you throw it up on the grill because it is _not_ tartare,” oh _ew_ , David really needs this conversation to end, “would you laugh at that person?” 

“I would never laugh at you.” _To your face_ , his mind corrects.

“And then would you condescendingly explain that you need to cook the meal yourself? Honestly. Do I look like a cook?” David opens his mouth to say something and then thinks better of it. “Do you see Michelin Stars on these walls?” 

“No, I don’t—”

“This was a power play,” she says and moves over to the ridiculously-busty mannequin next to her desk that holds the outfit for her Letter from the Editor shoot tomorrow and eyes it warily. “She can’t handle the fact that there are two successful women in this relationship so she has to sabotage it so she can have the upper hand. I can’t stand people like that. It fills me with such a rage that I just want to—” Before he knows it, she’s taking her beet juice and pouring it all over the white suit before kicking it to the ground.

“Find me something else to wear tomorrow. If it’s something you're capable of.” Wendy snaps as she storms out of her office. “And get me a new juice!” 

It’s late when Patrick finds him laying down in The Closet, with the ruined suit in one hand and a jar of pretzels in the other. 

“Well, it looks like your day has gone about as well as mine has,” he says. “Ronnie told me I was useless and then ripped me a new one which sucks. But at least I can still catch Polo Guy for a late dinner.” David makes no attempt to reply and just tosses a few more pretzels into his mouth. His face must reflect his mood because Patrick sits down on the floor next to him and frowns, “What’s wrong?” 

He throws Wendy’s ruined suit —which has somehow also ripped in the last few hours, because _of course_ — in his general direction, “Wendy went psycho and destroyed her office and her outfit for her shoot in the morning, so I have—” he checks his phone and wants to cry, “—about thirteen hours to make something in here work.” 

Patrick picks up the suit and stands up and offers David his hand, “Well, I’m not Tim Gunn or Heidi Klum, but maybe I can help?” 

David thinks it might be the nicest thing anyone’s ever done for him. But he can’t tell Patrick that, obviously, so what he settles on is, “I’m very impressed that you know Project Runway.” 

“Yeah, well. My mom says the only good thing about me living in New York is that I live so close to Mood fabrics. She has me send her stuff all the time.” Patrick shrugs. 

“She’s not wrong. It’s one of my favorite places,” he says as he watches Patrick lay the suit down on a couch and look around the room. “You don’t have to do this.”

Patrick smiles softly, “I’d like to.” he says, and walks over to the rack with the dresses, flipping through them. 

David walks up next to him and starts looking through as well. “What about Polo Guy?”

Patrick smirks. “Well, I wouldn’t want to wear one sweater every day,” he says and David fights a grin. “I’ve heard that’s not good.” 

“It isn’t,” David sniffs and pulls a Miu Miu dress off the rack. “Whoever told you that sounds very wise.” 

“He is,” Patrick says lightly, “very old and very wise.” 

David shoots him a dirty look and pulls the dress off of the hanger to put on a mannequin. 

He’s walking around it to see it at different angles when Patrick asks him, “So if Wendy is so crazy, why are you working for her?” 

David pauses before walking over to the shoe wall to give himself a distraction. “I’ve wanted to work in fashion since I was little.” he says, and plays with the straps on the wedges in front of him. 

He remembers sneaking into his mother’s closet whenever she was away filming and trying on her dresses and her skirts and fur coats and heels whenever he was alone. And he was alone a lot.

He was so terrified the first time she caught him wearing one of her outfits, but all she said was, “Oh, David. One must always be assiduous when choosing a pair of shoes to go with their gown. The outfit must course from one piece to the next, like a leisurely streamlet. Wear mummy’s Manolo Blahnik’s instead.” 

He blinks out of the memory and picks up a pair of Jimmy Choo slingbacks. “My dream has always been to be a fashion editor at Vogue, maybe Editor-in-Chief if Anna Wintour ever dies– it’s the only way she’d ever give up the job.” He places the shoes down next to the mannequin and shrugs, “And this isn’t Vogue, but well. At least it’s not Glamour.” 

Patrick is staring at him a little too intently, a little too _knowingly_ , that David has to clear his throat and walk over to the blazers just to get away from it. 

“I get it,” Patrick follows him and starts casually looking at blazers so he doesn’t look at David directly while he talks, “it’s why I work for Ronnie. I wanted to write the kind of articles that used to make me cry when I was a kid,” David snorts and Patrick nudges his shoulder, “and she’s the best sports journalist there is.” 

“Have you written anything?” David asks. Patrick pulls two blazers from the rack and offers them to David. David doesn’t like either of them so he puts them back and grabs the blazer right next to them. 

Patrick rolls his eyes, “No. I mean, I’ve started something but it’s... it’s nowhere near done,” he laughs nervously and fidgets with the sleeves on one of the blazers. “It’s just... I mean my days are so long and I’m so tired when I get home that everything I end up writing is awful—”

“I doubt that.”

Patrick shakes his head, “No it’s true! It’s… really bad. And I—” He pauses and looks like he’s trying to find the words for something.

David decides the pants that normally go with this blazer are too wide, so he turns to look for another pair to give Patrick some privacy. After a moment Patrick continues, “I feel like when I started this job, I was so focused on impressing Ronnie and getting her to like me that I put all of my effort into being the _best_ assistant I could be and making sure she had everything she needed that I-I don’t know. I might’ve lost what little writing skill I had.” 

David finds a pair of pants and turns to Patrick, “Well that’s not true,” he says. “You’re a terrible assistant.” 

Patrick barks out a laugh and something in David’s chest tightens. Must be all of the pretzels he’s eaten tonight.

\--

The next night after David finishes logging the clothes he borrowed for Wendy’s shoot back into the system, he finds her at his desk, absolutely wasted.

“David!” she yells, and David is suddenly very thankful that it’s only the two of them left in the office. “My number one bitch!” 

David doesn’t know how to respond to that so he just says, “Wendy! Are you… alright?” 

She smiles sloppily and takes a swig from the champagne bottle she’s holding, “You know, you’re a good person.” 

“I— thank you?” He genuinely has no idea what’s going on here.

“You are a good person, with a beautiful eye for patterns. And I should tell you that more often.” David knows she won’t remember any of this tomorrow, but before he can say anything back, she claps, “Yes! David, I _would_ like another drink. Come with me.” 

David follows her into her office and slowly takes a seat. She grabs a bottle of whiskey from the bar cart next to her desk and when she can’t open it she tries to slam it down on her desk. “Oh no! Here, just let me…” He takes the bottle from her hands and opens it before pouring some into the two glasses she’s placed on her desk. 

Once she takes a sip she says, “Ugh. I hate losing, David. I’m a winner, and winners are winners because they never lose.” 

“Yes,” David says cautiously and takes a sip of his drink, “that is the definition of a winner.” 

“She thinks I’m a loser, David.” _Oh_ , ok and now they’re talking about Ronnie. “So what should I do? What would _you_ do?” 

“Um. I would...apologize.” Because while David is still an asshole, he’s a much better person than he used to be. 

Wendy makes a face and blows a raspberry. “No. Next option please.” 

“No, I would honestly apologize,” he says and pours some more whiskey into his glass, because he needs it to have this conversation. “And tell her...I don’t know. Tell her she’s good at her job or that you respect her or something.” He takes a sip. “Tell her that you see her.” 

Wendy makes a face, “What does that even mean?” 

David shrugs and takes another sip before taking a deep breath, “I don’t know. But it…it’s what I would want to hear.” 

\-- 

“Hey Patrick, if it’s not too much trouble for you, could you actually do what I pay you for and schedule something after my twelve o’clock tomorrow? I need a reason to leave my sister’s house early.” Ronnie says when he drops off her dinner.

“Oh, sorry,” he apologizes, “I didn’t realize your lunch was with family.” 

“If you don’t know these things then is there a point in keeping you around?” She dismisses him and Patrick takes a deep breath when he gets back to his desk. 

Ronnie is the best. She’s stressed. He’ll be fine. 

He’s working on Ronnie’s schedule for the next day when David texts him. 

_WENDY IS SHITFACED AND COMING DOWNSTAIRS. DO NOT LET HER SEE YOU._

“What the...” he mutters and looks around the empty office. He hears the elevator doors ding and just barely manages to fling himself under his desk by the time Wendy walks by.

“What are you doing here?” He hears Ronnie ask.

Wendy is going on about ‘seeing her’ and Patrick tries to crawl away from his desk so he can make it to the elevators without being seen.

Ronnie starts laughing and says, “Lock the door.” 

Patrick’s mind is screaming _abort… abort… ABORT,_ and he manages to get back under his desk when Wendy turns around and locks the door (which is unfortunately made of glass, like the rest of Ronnie’s fucking walls) and walks over to Ronnie's chair and… oh god. 

Patrick tries to crawl away with his eyes closed when he bumps into someone’s desk and he needs to get out of here, like _now_. Once he’s out of sight from Ronnie’s office he makes a run for the elevator. 

Well, at least they made up.

\--

David is at home, finalizing the amenities for Wendy and Ronnie’s hotel room when Patrick knocks on his door. 

“Alright, we are officially a go for Nantucket. Their plane lands in an hour and I put the champagne on Wendy’s credit card,” Patrick says, handing David the card when he opens the door. 

“That’ll go beautifully with the ambience I created with their hotel room. I created a new mood board and everything,” David says and grabs a water out of his fridge. “There’ll be a cacophony of orgasms, if all goes to plan.” 

Patrick snorts and before he can turn to leave, Stevie pokes her head out of her room and grins. “Did somebody say orgasms?” 

David rubs a hand over his eyes, already regretting this. “Patrick, this is Stevie. Stevie, this is Patrick. Stevie runs a hotel in the city, and Patrick is an assistant to a woman who literally cannot stand him.” 

Patrick rolls his eyes, “It’s nice to meet you Stevie, I’ve heard a lot about you.” 

Stevie shakes his hand and says, “None of it is true.”

Patrick smirks and looks at David, “Well of course. I mean anyone with a fiber of common sense would know that.”

Stevie breaks out into a wide eyed grin and looks at David, “I like him,” and David literally can’t stand either of them in this minute. She turns to Patrick and crosses her arms, “I like you.”

David is about to kick both of them out of the apartment when he finally takes a look at Patrick. “You look nice. And no braided belt– where are you going, the Met?” 

Patrick messes with the (appropriate length) sleeves on his button up. It’s still blue, but it’s short and shows off his arms in a way that gives David some very non-platonic feelings. “Ha ha,” he crosses his arms and shrugs. “I have Rachel’s engagement party tonight, so. What are _you_ wearing– are you seriously in a sweater?” 

David shrugs. “It’s Givenchy.” 

Patrick laughs. “It’s the middle of July.”

Stevie starts laughing with him, “Yeah David, it’s _July_.” 

David makes a face. He should’ve just had Patrick drop off the card at work on Monday. “Ok, you two are _not_ friends,” he says, gesturing between them.

Stevie looks at Patrick innocently. “It feels like we’re friends.” 

Patrick nods. “I mean, _I_ think we’re friends.” 

David makes a noise in disapproval and goes to grab his bag, “Mhm, yes ok we’re already running late for this party and I don’t have time to feel attacked by this imbalanced social dynamic.” 

“Patrick, would you like to be my plus one to this pool party?” Stevie asks, even though she’s in no position to do so.

Patrick smiles sheepishly, “No I don’t think so. I should probably get home and finish writing. To distract myself.” 

David is oscillating between two alternate sweaters to bring to change into once the sun goes down, they’re also Givenchy, and while David prefers not to wear the same designer all day, they’re the only options that fit both his color scheme and mood today. He glances up from his choices at Patrick. “Distract yourself from what?” 

Patrick clears his throat and looks down, “The fact that Polo Guy hasn’t called me in a few days.” 

David decides to bring both and zips up his bag. “Like, no contact at all?” 

Patrick shrugs it off, “It’ll be fine, he’ll probably call me soon. He said he was gonna come with me to Rachel’s engagement party. It’s— I’m not worried about it.” 

Stevie puts her hand on his shoulder, “You should definitely come to this party then.”

“Stevie—” David tries to stop her.

She continues like she didn’t hear him, “There’ll be free booze. And hot dogs.” 

Patrick looks at David and grins. “Oh, well then, _absolutely_. I’m there.” 

“You can’t do that though.” David says, “Because you’re already my plus one, and I’m Alexis’ plus one. So that’s…that’s a plus three.” 

Stevie whistles low. “Impressive math skills there, David.” 

David glares at Patrick when he laughs. “Ok — we need to go.”

As soon as they walk through the door to the rooftop, he can hear his sister calling his name. “David —oh my god, excuse me thanks so much— David, over here!” 

Alexis is wearing a sequined caftan and a comically large sunhat, which she tries to flip over her eyes when she sees them. 

“Oh my god, David who is _this_ cutie?” she gestures to Patrick with a little wave.

David rolls his eyes, “This is my friend Patrick, from work.” 

“Mmm, yum do you have one of those like, cute little cubicle jobs too?” she adds a little shimmy for effect. 

Patrick laughs, “Something like that. It’s nice to meet you…?”

“Oh, right!” She laughs, “I am Alexis,” she says, gesturing to the giant ‘A’ necklace she’s wearing, “and I’m David’s sister and life coach and brand invigorator. It’s nice to meet you.” She grabs his hand, “Oh, I’m sorry if my hands are a little slippery, I just put on a _lot_ of tanning oil.” 

David can immediately see what she’s doing. “He’s gay.” He tells her when Patrick and Stevie wander off to the bar. 

Alexis grins and slaps his shoulder, “Oh my god, David, I knew I was getting a vibe. Except it wasn’t for _me_ , it was for _you_.” 

David makes a face, “Vibe...what vibe? There’s no vibe. We’re _friends_. Plus he’s kind of dating someone else. I think.” 

“Well, I know a vibe when I see one. And trust me, it's there.” She gives him a double blink, which he thinks is supposed to be a wink. “Brb, I have to get to the wall over there and do a boomerang pretending to eat these hair gummies because if I don’t do it soon everyone will have one and then I’ll have to do an insta live where I actually have to eat them, and I’m super uninterested in that, so.” She taps his nose and disappears. 

Alexis manages to join them again once she's taken a million selfies and they’ve made it inside to the beer pong table. “ _Stevie_ ,” she says loudly and flips her hair, “me and you should totally team up for this next game, isn’t that like a super great idea?” She flicks her wrists in what David has dubbed her ‘T-Rex wave’ while not so subtly glancing over to where Patrick is checking his phone next to David.

Stevie says, “I think that’s a great idea,” like the traitor she is. “As sad as I am to break up the dynamic duo...” She says and reaches out to Patrick.

Patrick laughs and grabs her hand, “It had to happen sometime I guess.” 

David moodily drinks his beer, “I just want it on record how much I hate this. Also, dynamic duo? I’ve literally beat you three times _by myself_.” 

Patrick drapes an arm over his shoulder, “Why don’t you want to be on my team, David?” he asks innocently.

David shoots him a withering look, “Just set up the cups.” 

For someone so competitive, Patrick is truly awful at beer pong. He’s never seen someone trash talk someone else, before missing the shot. Multiple times. They’re midway through the game when David glances over at him, “Is that my beer?” 

“I don’t know, is it?” Patrick asks and puts it down next to the other bottle, which was clearly his.

David huffs and tosses the ping pong ball into another one of Alexis’ cups. She groans and picks it up. “If it is, you’re lucky you have a clean mouth, otherwise I wouldn’t be so fine with sharing.”

Patrick’s lips quirk up. “I’m sorry… a clean mouth?” 

“Some people have nice clean mouths, and some people have sloppy mouths.” Patrick nods like he knows what he’s talking about, and then picks David’s beer back up. “Ok, can I have my beer back please? With the way you’re playing it’s going to be gone in two seconds.” 

Patrick winks at him and takes a sip. “No you have a sloppy mouth.” And then tosses the ping pong ball towards one of Stevie’s cups and _misses_.

David doesn’t know what to say and fortunately for him Patrick glances back down at his phone again before he can short circuit. Patrick is frowning at his phone again so David reaches over and pulls it out of his hand, “Ok, he’s not gonna call you—"

Patrick tries to reach around and grab his phone so David puts it in his pocket, “C’mon, David—”

David puts a hand on his shoulder and says, “He’s not gonna call you and that’s _ok_.” 

Patrick's jaw clenches (which David does _not_ notice) and looks away, “It’s not ok, David. _I_ _slept with him._ I don’t do that with just anyone.” Alexis tosses a ping pong ball and it lands in one of their cups. Before David can do anything Patrick picks up the cup and knocks it back, “I shouldn’t be so surprised, I guess. I mean –and this might be petty– but something about his shoes always made me feel really weird. Like they were round but they—” 

“Squared off at the top?” 

“Yes!” 

“And you _slept_ with him?” 

“Well he wasn’t wearing the shoes then!” 

David laughs and when it’s their turn throws another ping pong ball into Stevie and Alexis’ final cup, winning the game that he’s basically had to carry on his back. “You know what, screw him.”

Patrick takes another sip of his beer, “Yeah, I know, I already did. That’s kind of the problem.” 

David rolls his eyes, “No, I mean forget about him. I’ll go with you to Rachel’s party. I will be your other sweater,” he says. “Your over-the-top, very-much-out-of-your-price-range sweater.” 

\--

Patrick is borderline sober but still just tipsy enough when they make it to Rachel’s party. He catches her talking to some cousins he knows she doesn’t like so he slips between them and pulls her into a hug. “Congratulations, Rach,” he says to her once he puts her down.

She grabs his face and obviously she’s a little tipsy too. “Thank you, Patty.” She brings him a little closer and glances over her shoulder at David, “Is that Polo Guy?” she whispers to him.

Patrick shakes his head and turns to David, “No, um. This is David, my friend from work.”

Rachel gives him a knowing look and smirks and suddenly he wants to jump off of this roof, “Oh. _This_ is David. It’s nice to finally meet you,” she says and shakes his hand. 

David smirks and looks at Patrick, “I’m sorry, do you talk about me at home?” 

Patrick turns to glare at Rachel who sips her drink innocently, “No I’ve never mentioned you.” 

Rachel nods knowingly, “Oh, must’ve been some other David from Sleek magazine.” 

David looks at Rachel and nods as well, “It is a very popular name in the office.” 

Patrick is beginning to see the imbalanced social dynamic that David was talking about earlier. 

Rachel eventually excuses herself to greet a few more guests and David grabs them both a drink from the bar. “Can I ask you a question?” he asks, and Patrick nods. “Does being here bring back any like, bad memories for you? I’m very good at coming up with reasons to leave a party and pulling an Irish exit if it is.” 

Patrick laughs. “No we broke up before we could get to the party.” He takes a sip of his drink and David looks a little more relaxed. “I’m so happy for her though. She deserves this. But, thank you for asking.” 

David tucks his smile into the corner of his mouth and nods and Patrick has to take a deep breath and another sip of his drink to ignore the fluttering going on in his stomach.

After Patrick and David play another round of beer pong (and David beats him _again_ — how is he so good at this? If it weren’t so hot, Patrick would definitely be more upset than he is) Rachel starts clinking her glass and they head over to where she’s standing on the stage. 

“So, as many of you may know. I have dated a few guys in my time. A couple of them are even here tonight,” she tosses a wink at Patrick while everyone laughs, “and I liked a lot of things about all of them. And then I met Andrew, and there were a lot of things I did _not_ like about him.” 

“Hey!” Andrew shouts and Rachel laughs. 

“Like, he dresses like a Mormon missionary, and he listens to Nickelback, _on purpose_ ,” everyone chuckles at that, “and every time he hears a siren he says, ‘that’s my ride!’”

“This is so fun for me,” he says to Patrick who claps a hand on his shoulder and grins. 

“But,” she takes a deep breath, and suddenly Andrew is the only person she’s looking at, “I just…I love him so much. Y’know, when I was a little girl, my grandma told me that you ‘like’ because, and you ‘love’ despite.” She takes a deep breath and wipes away the tears gathering in her eyes. “You like someone because of their qualities, and you love someone despite some of their qualities. And…oh, baby. I like you just as much as I love you, and I can’t wait to get to marry you.”

Patrick swallows the lump in his throat and wipes away some of the tears in his own eyes, suddenly very aware of David standing next to him. 

After everyone starts mingling again, Andrew and Rachel come over with four shot glasses. “I need everyone to get wasted so I have fun stories to tell,” she hands David and Patrick a shot and they all raise their glasses. “To the last penis of my life,” she cheers to Andrew, “and to the first!” she says to Patrick and takes her shot, David following with a laugh. 

Patrick and Andrew start laughing so hard they almost fall over. They share a weird bond, both loving this crazy woman, but in very, _very_ different ways. Once they down their shots, a siren rings in the distance. “That’s my ride!” Andrew falls over laughing again. 

David grins like he won something, “Oh wow, he really does say it!” 

The music starts playing an up tempo song and David grabs his hand, “Patrick come on, let’s dance. If I don’t sweat off some of this alcohol, I’m gonna be very drunk.” 

Patrick laughs and stays in his place, “I don’t think it works like that, David.”

David actually pulls on Patrick’s arm. “Come on, Patrick. Dance with me,” and Patrick can’t say no to David, so he lets David pull him on to the dance floor.

David starts bopping along to the music and Patrick stands there awkwardly. “I can’t,” he says, “I’m really bad at it.” 

David laughs and starts dancing actual circles around him, “Ok, no one’s ever as bad as they say they are.” 

“Ok, you asked for it.” Patrick warns, and starts dancing. 

It must be pretty bad to look at because David stops in his place and gapes at him, “...My God.” 

“I told you, but now you’ve unlocked something in me so we can’t stop.” 

“You’ve got legs like tree trunks!” 

Patrick laughs and is too drunk to care what he looks like, so he keeps dancing. The song fades and a slower one starts to play. Patrick stops, suddenly breathless, and looks at David, who is also looking at him with a look Patrick can’t quite place.

Patrick holds a hand out and David looks at him hesitantly, “C’mon, David,” he says and grabs his hand and pulls him closer. “Don’t be weird.” 

They settle into a rhythm after that. Patrick’s other hand lands on David’s shoulder and David’s hand settles on Patrick’s waist. Patrick doesn’t know if it’s because he’s really drunk, or if it’s because David feels solid and warm underneath his hands, but Patrick feels like he’s on a cloud. He has to physically fight the urge to lay his head down onto David's shoulder, in the space that connects with his neck (which Patrick is _not_ thinking about). Because they’re friends, and friends don’t do that. He thinks. 

Well, ok. Maybe friends can do that. He lets his head fall slowly into that space and for the first time in a really long time, maybe _ever_ , Patrick feels right. David doesn’t shrug him off, so maybe he was right. Friends can dance like this.

“What do you think Ronnie and Wendy’s ‘and yet’ is?” David murmurs after a minute.

Patrick stares at him, “Their what?” 

“Y’know, from Rachel’s speech. The ‘like’ because and ‘love’ despite. You know, when you’re in a relationship and they have all of these little quirks that should annoy you _and yet_ …you like them anyway,” he says, then adds, “or so I’ve been told. My longest relationship was for three months — four if you count the month he spent seeing other people.” 

Patrick shrugs and unconsciously pulls David a little closer, “They don’t have one, I guess. I mean, they can’t not like each other. Not yet anyways. Which means we must be doing something right.”

David hums, “What was your ‘and yet’ with Rachel?” 

“Oh,” he says and laughs. “‘And yet, I’m gay’. It didn’t really work the same way.” 

Patrick can feel David nod, “But friends can do it too, right? Like it’s not exclusive to just romantic partners?”

Patrick nods, “I think so.” 

David grins, “Like — Stevie is terrible at sincerity and drinks wine like she’s a drunken fish, and yet, I wouldn’t want to spend time with anyone else.” 

Patrick makes a humming noise, “Like you don’t know how to play literally any sport or order dinner on time, and yet you’re a good person, sometimes.” 

David huffs. “I’m a _great_ person. Some might even venture to call me beloved,” he replies, and adjusts his hand on Patrick’s waist. “Or like, you are psychotically competitive but somehow still nice to everyone, except me apparently. And yet, you’re a _terrible_ dancer.” 

Patrick bites back the grin that’s fighting it’s way onto his face, “I don’t think it works like that.” 

\--

Rachel feels someone come up behind her and when she’s spun around, she comes face to face with Patrick. “You are _so_ drunk,” she laughs. 

Patrick nods, “I am and it is your fault, and you are equally as drunk.” She nods because, well, he’s not lying. Patrick grabs her hands and pulls them close to his chest. “Rachel,” he says as seriously as he can, “I love you more than anything, and I could not be happier for you. But I need pizza, and there is no pizza here, so I gotta go.”

She laughs and kisses his cheek, and lets him leave.

She smiles softly as Patrick pulls David through the door (“Tugging on Givenchy is incorrect, Patrick!”) before turning her attention to the delivery guy approaching from the other direction.

“Where do you want these?” He asks, holding ten pizza boxes stacked on top of each other. 

She smiles. “You can just put them on the table over there.”

\--

After a near death experience, they somehow make it back to David’s building, and all of his energy is focused on not dropping this pizza. 

Patrick is staring at the pizza box like it’s the most beautiful thing on the planet and then he looks up at David, “I know this isn’t gonna sound the way I mean it to sound,” he pauses and looks at the box again, “but I want to fuck this pizza.”

David nods his head vigorously. “I get it.” Because he does. But he laughs and puts his free hand on Patrick’s shoulder and says, “But do me a favor, and never repeat that to anyone you respect, ok?” 

Patrick smiles softly, “Ok, David.”

David turns around and unlocks the front door before immediately closing it. He turns back to Patrick, “Fuck. Stevie’s playing Sarah McLachlan.” 

Patrick is making grabby hands at the pizza and David lifts it up above his head a bit, out of his reach. “So? Sarah McLachlan is awesome.” 

“Of course she is– I followed Lilith Fair for two summers. But it means that she has _a lady_ over,” David says, and then adds, “to have sex with.” 

“Yeah, no I got that.” Patrick manages to grab the pizza from him and David only protests a little bit. “I have an idea.” He says and runs back down the stairs onto the street. 

When David gets back down onto the street, Patrick is trying to pull down the ladder on their fire escape with one hand. “You’re gonna drop it!” David practically shouts and runs to grab the pizza from him. 

“Yeah, here take it while I—” Patrick hands him the pizza and uses both hands to pull the rest of the ladder down. Once he does, he turns back to David and tries to grab the pizza back, “Ok I’ll take that.”

David pulls it out of his reach, “Oh no. I’m gonna take it up.” 

Patrick laughs and goes to grab it, “You can’t take it up, you don’t have the steady hand that I do.” 

“Well I watched you play beer pong horribly today, so I know that’s not the case.” David holds the pizza higher above his head. It’s playing dirty, but he’s not risking the pizza.

Patrick climbs the first two rungs and is just above David’s head when he reaches down to snatch the box from David. “See, I’m gonna hold it in one hand and climb with the other. Like Spider-Man.” 

Patrick starts up the rest of the ladder and David tries so hard not to stare at his ass while he climbs up behind him. He really does. But his self-discipline fades and he allows himself one look. Just one. Mid-range denim, who knew?

“Oh my god, Patrick. _Be careful_.” He will one hundred percent have a heart attack if Patrick drops this pizza. “Keep the top up otherwise the cheese will slide off!” Patrick shakes the box just to be a dick. “Patrick! Do not drop my pizza!”

“Stop making me laugh and I won’t!” 

Once David makes it to his floor, he props open the window and lets Patrick in first before following. He flicks on his light and takes his sweater off to hang it up on the clothing rack he keeps in his room because pizza grease and Givenchy are not a good mix. He flops down on the floor next to his bed and Patrick carefully sits down next to him with the box.

David holds his breath, “One, two— ”

“Three,” Patrick finishes and opens the box. The pizza is perfect and David wants to cry in relief.

David grabs the box and holds it out for him, “Since you so heroically carried it up the fire escape, and I am notoriously a generous person, you can have the first slice.” 

Patrick grins and takes a slice, and David places the box on the floor before grabbing one for himself.

The first slice of a really good pizza is always borderline orgasmic, and David just needs a moment with it. Patrick seems to get it as he silently eats next to him.

David has spent a lot of time sitting in silence. His mind flickers briefly to dinners when he was a kid when his family would sometimes eat dinner together —if his sister was in the country and his mom wasn’t off filming— too preoccupied with their own lives to talk about their days, so they’d just eat in silence. It doesn’t feel anything like it does now, sitting in his room with Patrick. 

After a while, Patrick rests his head on the edge of the bed and turns to face David. “I’m really glad you stole my boss’ dinner, David.” 

David tries to fight the smile forming on his face. He thinks he’s doing it. “Me too.” 

“‘And I’m so glad you came up with the plan to set our bosses up, Patrick and given me copious amounts of free time.’” 

David goes to grab another slice from the box. “Mm, a bold claim.”

Patrick laughs and grabs another slice from the box and starts picking it apart, “I think this is the best meal I’ve ever had,” and David watches his throat as he swallows a piece of cheese, “in my entire life.”

Patrick catches David’s eye and David feels like he’s on fire. He’s never had— no one’s ever looked at him this intensely, or for this long before. Patrick’s eyes are like starlight and he can’t look away. His skin feels like it’s buzzing and he needs to take a breath before he does something stupid. 

David takes one more second and decides he’s ok with doing something stupid when Patrick drops his gaze and takes a deep breath, “Well, I guess I should probably get going. Home. I should probably get home.” 

The moment is over and David blinks it away. “Slice for the road?”

Patrick looks at the box and nods, “Two please.” 

David grabs two slices and rolls them up before handing them to him, “Crust side out, of course. We’re not animals.” 

Patrick laughs and gets up, heading towards the window so he can hop back out onto the fire escape. David follows him and grabs the window so he can close it. 

“Goodnight, David.”

“Goodnight, Patrick.”

He watches Patrick try to hold both slices of pizza in his mouth while he tries to get back down the fire escape. David tucks his smile to the corner of his mouth until Patrick has disappeared from view and once he’s gone he lets it go free, feeling it fill his entire face and— oh no. Oh, he’s so fucked.

\-- 

Patrick is confused the following Monday when he gets back to his desk after grabbing his morning tea and sees David leaning against it. “What are you doing here?” he asks, putting the cup on his desk.

David shrugs. “I have no idea. I got a very cryptic email from Ronnie asking me to meet her up here.” 

Ronnie pops out of her office like she’s been somehow summoned and Patrick tries to hide the laugh that comes up when David jumps. “Brewer! You two,” she gestures to him and David, “get in here.” 

They walk into her office and Patrick closes the door. Ronnie stares at them for a moment. “Brewer, this is David, Wendy’s assistant. David this is my assistant, Patrick. I’m sure you’ve probably crossed paths at some point.”

David nods a little too quickly. For someone who once claimed to be aloof and mysterious, he’s not convincing at all. “Yes, I’m sure we have. It’s nice to meet you, Patrick.” He reaches out and shakes Patrick’s hand.

Patrick nods, in on the secret. “It’s nice to meet you too, David.” 

Ronnie sits in her chair and leans forward on her desk. “Well, you guys better get used to seeing each other.”

Patrick is even more confused than when he walked in. “Wait why—”

“I’m getting to that, Brewer, if you don’t mind not jumping the gun?” He flushes and nods before she continues, “I’m going to propose to Wendy,” she says casually, like she would say ‘the sky is blue’ or ‘my work has revolutionized professional sports protocol.’

Patrick is frozen. He doesn’t know what to do, or say. He risks a glance at David who looks equally as shocked. After a minute Patrick says, “Oh wow. Um, congratulations?” 

Ronnie rolls her eyes, “Thanks, Brewer. I can really feel the affection wafting off of you.” She reaches over to her bag and grabs her wallet, before handing Patrick her credit card, “I need you to go pick out a ring, in a reasonable price range,” she directs to him, “David should know what she likes.”

Patrick takes the card and swallows the lump in his throat— and is he sweating? He might be sweating a little bit. “When do you want it by?” 

“Ideally as soon as possible,” Ronnie says, “I’m gonna be busy finishing up this Brady spread so I don’t have time to get it myself and I’d like to propose to her on Friday.” 

“But that’s… that’s like in four days.” Patrick stumbles and looks at David for guidance, but David still looks as gobsmacked as he feels.

Ronnie gives him a dry look, “Yes, I know what the days of the week are, Brewer. Thank you.” She turns back to her computer, checking out of the conversation. “Have Eric cover the phones while you’re out, and do not come back to this office without a ring.”

Patrick nods wordlessly and stands there for what feels like forever because David has to pull him out of the office.

Once they’re in the elevator, Patrick lets out the breath he’s been holding for the past five minutes. Oh god. It was never supposed to go this far.

“Holy shit,” David breathes next to him. 

Patrick thumps his head against the wall. “I know.”

“Holy _shit_ ,” David says again and Patrick can only nod. “We really did it… _and then some_.”

David starts talking about cut and clarity and diamonds and Patrick is only half listening. “This is good right?” he asks once he thinks David has stopped.

David nods, “This is fucking _great_. Beyond. Once they’re married Wendy will spend virtually no time in the office, delegating everything to the point where she’ll just have to promote me. And the same for Ronnie…you could probably get your article published on her site!” 

Patrick takes a breath and heads out of the elevator when the doors open. That is what he wanted. It’s true, that’s what he wanted. But. “Is it right though? I mean, they barely know each other. Marriage is _marriage_.” 

David waves him off, “Wendy’s been married three times already, twice to the same guy. And they _do_ know each other— they’ve been going on dates every day for the past two months.” 

“Yeah, dates that we set up specifically tailored to them—” Patrick protests, and David stops and turns him around, placing his hands on his shoulders.

He takes a deep breath and Patrick instinctively takes one too and it settles him. “Patrick, it’s gonna be ok. Did we set up their dates? Yes, we’re _assistants_. But they’ve spent literally every day together, so they’ve had to have talked at some point. They are grown adults who can make their own decisions.” Patrick opens his mouth to protest and David shakes his head, “Remember when we started this and you asked me to trust you?” he asks quietly and Patrick nods. David leans forward a bit and whispers, “Now I’m asking you to trust me. We’re gonna be fine.”

Patrick takes another deep breath. David’s right. Of course David’s right. “You’re right. Ok. I trust you, David.” 

David does that thing where he tucks his smile into the corner of his mouth and Patrick feels a little lighter than he did a minute ago. “Good, because we have work to do. I’m genuinely terrified of what will happen if we go back to Ronnie empty handed.” 

They end up at Tiffany’s because it's ‘timeless, classic, and a little basic’ according to David and that’s ‘essentially Wendy in a nutshell.’

They walk in and a saleswoman comes up to them with a bright grin, “What can I help you with today?” 

David takes over with a practiced, charming grin, “We’re looking for an engagement ring.” 

Her grin somehow gets even brighter, “Oh congratulations! I have some great options for men if you follow me over here.”

David’s mouth drops open and he looks over at Patrick, “Oh! I um, we– I mean. Um.” 

Patrick is pretty sure he’s bright red but he manages to get out, “It’s not for us. I mean– we’re not, um. We’re here to get an engagement ring for our boss.” 

The saleswoman laughs, “Oh got it. Sorry guys! Do you have any idea what you’re looking for?” 

David has recovered (the charming smile is back) and says, “Preferably something with a cushion cut and a diamond band.”

She leads them over to a glass display case and pulls out a tray of rings. David examines them and says to Patrick, “If it’s not at least four carats, she will say no.” 

Patrick defers to David’s judgment because he’s never had to pick out an engagement ring before. The one he’d proposed to Rachel with had belonged to his grandmother and now it sat in the bottom of his sock drawer. 

David has narrowed it down to two when his phone pings. He glances down at it and frowns, “Wendy wants me to help her go over a layout,” He grins at Patrick and glances down at the tray, eventually picking one up and handing it to Patrick. It looks very pretty and very, _very_ expensive and the sinking feeling that Patrick had earlier is coming back. “Pick this one.”

Patrick nods and tells David that he’ll stop by his desk after he gives the ring to Ronnie and then David leaves.

The sales girl smiles at him when he turns back around, “So are you ready?” 

\-- 

Patrick makes his way back up to his desk, and after checking in with Eric, he heads into Ronnie’s office.

She looks up from her computer when he enters and puts the credit card back on her desk. “So did you get it?”

Patrick’s heart is thumping so loud he can hear it in his ears. “No, I didn’t.” 

Ronnie huffs and shakes her head, “Brewer, I asked you to do one thing.”

“No, I know,” he says and takes a deep breath. _Here goes nothing_. “But before you spend all of this money on an engagement ring, I need to tell you something.”

\-- 

She fires him, because of course she does. 

The sun is starting to set once Patrick leaves HR after negotiating his severance (pretty good, considering), his benefits (not great, but they weren’t even before he got fired), and prospective recommendations (not likely, so he didn’t bother to ask).

Ronnie was so mad when she threw him out of her office that the thought of returning to his desk to grab his things makes him physically ill.

He gets into the elevator, hoping he can grab David and explain what happened before he leaves for the night. 

Patrick takes a moment once the doors close and takes a deep breath. He just got fired and probably tanked his career in the process, but still. As bad as the past few hours have been, he somehow feels better.

That is, until he steps onto the 21st floor. As soon as he steps out of the elevator he can hear someone screaming in the distance and what sounds like furniture crashing.

He goes up to the donut shaped desk and the receptionist sitting behind it, “What’s going on— is that Wendy?” he asks when she looks up at him with a bored expression.

She nods and snaps her gum. “Where’s David, is he here?” He tries again when she looks back down at her magazine.

The receptionist snorts and flips a page, “Oh, you didn’t hear?” she asks without looking up, “Wendy fired him.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Did I write this entire fic for that pizza scene alone? Yeah, I did.
> 
> I'm on Tumblr, come say [hi](https://lilythesilly.tumblr.com)!


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _“You stood in front of me and told me to...to trust you. And then you got me fired.”_
> 
> _Patrick tries to lighten the mood, “Well, if it makes you feel better I also got fired.”_
> 
> _David fixes him with a stare that tells him that was not the thing to say. ___

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We made it to the end! There's still a little epilogue that I'm posting tomorrow, but this is the last chapter! It's been like 8 years since I've written fic, and writing this has been both scary and exciting haha. Thank you to everyone who read, commented & left kudos; it really means a lot ❤️

Patrick doesn’t really know how much time has passed, but he does know that he’s basically sprinting to David’s apartment from the subway. He sneaks into the building with a delivery person and takes the stairs up to David’s floor instead of the elevator (because he feels like he’s vibrating and he needs to keep moving). Once he gets to David’s door he takes a deep breath (is he out of breath? That gasping noise can’t be him.) and checks to make sure he isn’t sweating before he knocks on the door. 

Stevie opens it and snorts when she sees him. “Wow.” 

Patrick feels like he’s moving a million miles a minute so he tries to keep his voice steady, “Stevie please I just—”

“Stevie can you tell whoever is at the door to fuck off? _I’m going through something_.” He hears David shout from inside.

Stevie starts to close the door and Patrick’s breath picks up again so he puts his hand on it to stop her, “Please, Stevie. I just need five minutes. I need to explain. I-I didn’t want this to happen. Please, you have to believe me."

Stevie watches him for a moment, something flickering in her eyes that Patrick can’t quite read. She finally closes the door and Patrick slumps against the wall next to it. Fuck.

The door opens again and Stevie is holding a purse. “David, I’m going to get more wine!” She steps out into the hallway and levels Patrick with a stare that has him wanting to shrink into the wall. She points towards the open apartment, “Fix this.” she says and tosses the strap of the purse over her shoulder, “I still like you, y’know.” she says quietly and disappears down the hall.

Patrick steps into the apartment cautiously and finds David laying on his couch with a compress over his eyes. After a few moments of standing there awkwardly he clears his throat. 

David takes the compress off and glances up. He can see the moment he registers Patrick being there because he immediately shoots up off of the couch and walks to the opposite corner of the room.

“David, I’m...I’m so sorry. I didn’t think…” Patrick stops and pauses so he can actually get this out, “I had _no_ idea Wendy would do that. I didn’t even _tell_ Wendy. I just...please let me explain.” 

David is actively avoiding looking him in the eye but he shrugs, “You don’t have to explain yourself to me.”

Patrick thinks back a month, to the last time David said that and he really wishes they were back at that Yankee game now, instead of here. “I really do.” 

David waves his hand dismissively, “I know. That’s just what I’m supposed to say.” 

Patrick takes a deep breath and flexes his hands, “I really am sorry, David. Before I tell you why I did it, I need you to know how sorry I am. I never wanted you to lose your job. I _know_ how important it was.” 

David’s jaw clenches like he wants to say something and is physically stopping himself before settling on crossing his arms.

He hasn’t thrown Patrick out of his apartment yet, so he’ll take it, “I just. I was standing in that jewelry store after you left and looking at this giant ring...and I _couldn’t_ do it. I just–I _know_ what it’s like to propose to someone even though it’s a mistake and I couldn’t let Ronnie do that without knowing the whole truth.” 

David’s eyes are flickering, “I get that Patrick, I really do. But why was this a decision you had to make on your own? You could’ve told me what you were thinking! I thought we were friends.”

“We are friends!”

“You told me no one would ever know and then you...you–” David takes a steadying breath and presses his lips together, “you stood in front of me and told me to...to trust _you_. And then you got me _fired_.”

Patrick tries to lighten the mood, “Well, if it makes you feel better I also got fired.”

David fixes him with a stare that tells him that was not the thing to say. “So when you said you trusted me this afternoon, you were lying.” 

“No, David _of course_ I trust you.”

“Obviously you don’t!” 

Something has been itching in the back of Patrick’s brain for the past few minutes, begging to be said, and he ignores it until he can’t anymore. He tries to tread as lightly as he can, “I mean...and I am _not_ using this to justify how I went about things, but, you weren’t completely innocent in all of this either, y’know. If you were, Wendy wouldn’t’ve fired you.”

David narrows his eyes, “What is _that_ supposed to mean?” 

Patrick’s jaw twitches. “I’m just saying that you’re kind of acting like some helpless victim who didn’t deserve—”

“Oh, so I _deserve_ it now—”

That’s not what Patrick meant to say. He sighs and rubs his face so he can say the right words, “No! I didn’t mean that. I just mean, that you are _equally_ as complicit in this as I am. You were right there beside me the whole time.” 

“I know that, I’m not an _idiot_.” David snaps and that is _not_ what Patrick said at all. “What I’m mad at is the fact that you did this behind my back.”

“I didn’t know I was going to do it until I did it!” 

“So 26 years of meticulous planning and scheduling and suddenly you’re overcome with the need to be impulsive—”

“ _You don’t get it, David!_ You don’t.” 

David’s jaw locks and he stares at him for another moment before taking a calculated step forward. “Do you want know what I really think, Patrick?” It’s a rhetorical question, but even if it wasn’t Patrick couldn’t answer anyway because his heart has lodged somewhere in his throat. “I think you secretly wanted to spend the rest of your life as an assistant.” 

Patrick feels his face flush and he scoffs, finding his voice, “That’s ridiculous.”

David tilts his head and leans forward, like he wants to tell him a secret. “Tell me, Patrick. Have you actually written anything with all this ‘free time’ we’ve had, or are you still just ‘planning to’?” Patrick’s pulse picks up and he glances at the floor so he doesn’t have to look at David. David’s gone from being upset to just being _mean_. He hums deliberately, like he finally understands Patrick and it makes him feel itchy and uncomfortable. He doesn’t like it. “I think you’d rather run around and be Ronnie’s personal chew toy than actually write something and figure out you’ve wasted your time because you were right and you lost any skill you had.” 

And Patrick...well. Patrick can’t say anything to that, so he just leaves.

\--

David isn’t _wallowing_ per se. 

Well, he’s watched Notting Hill about twenty times in the past few days alone, but still. 

Ok. He might be wallowing. Whether it’s because of losing his job or his fight with Patrick is a little more unclear. 

He’s watching Hugh Grant confess his feelings at a press conference for the twenty _first_ time when something buzzes next to him.

“Oh my god, Alexis, if you’re going to spend time here can you tell your phone to fuck off or at least take it off vibrate?” David snaps and turns the volume up on the television.

Alexis grabs her phone off of his nightstand and huffs. “Oh my god, David. Just because you and that sweet button face are in a thing, doesn’t mean you have to be such a grumpy duck.”

“We aren’t _in_ a thing. We aren’t anything.” 

Alexis flicks her bangs out of her eyes, “Ok well I saw the way you two looked at each other last weekend at that pool party, so the odds of you not being _anything_ seems super unlikely to me.”

“He got me _fired from my job_!” David’s voice raises with each word.

Alexis shrugs. “And? Stavros literally once left me on an island so he could do a drug run on dad’s jet and take Audrina Patridge to Diddy’s White Party and I still forgave him.” 

David leans over on his bed and looks at her, “Ok, do me a favor?” he asks quietly and she nods, “And never tell that story to literally anyone ever again.” 

Alexis mutters, “ugh, fine whatever, David” and leans back against his pillows to swipe through her phone. It buzzes again and when David pauses the movie to glare at her she groans, “Oh my god, David. You’re so dramatic!” and makes a show of turning the vibrate off. 

David plays the movie, even though he’s only eighty seven percent paying attention. His mind keeps going back to Patrick and his face when he left last week. Patrick was usually an avid texter (he once spent five minutes double texting him about something called a ‘no-hitter’ like David was supposed to know what that means) but after their fight the texts had decidedly stopped. 

David tries to ignore it and focus on the movie and not pay attention to the coiling feeling in his stomach. David did what he does best; he pushes and pushes until he goes too far and they’re not interested in him enough to push back. 

So what if David thought Patrick was different? He's not and David is honestly better off knowing that now. 

(A part of him knows that Patrick was different, but he doesn’t want to think about that right now.)

The thing is though, that if David doesn’t think about Patrick, he has to think about Wendy and that’s honestly _so_ much worse.

What do you do when your dreams have been destroyed because you tried to advance too fast in a borderline sociopathic climb to the top? David glances at the giant cookie he bought from the bakery down the street and back at the television screen where Julia Roberts and Hugh Grant are getting married and guesses it’s this. 

He watches the credits of the movie roll before rewinding it back to the press conference scene and shoving the rest of the cookie in his mouth. 

Alexis’s eyes flit between him and the screen for a moment before she huffs and gets off of the bed. She grabs the remote from his hands (which he _vehemently_ protests to) and pauses the movie before crossing the room and flinging the curtains open. 

David burrows into his blankets even more. “Ok, what are you even doing? It’s 6pm, the sun isn’t even really out like that right now.” He glances out the window where the sunlight has moved from a bright light to just a warm glow before the sun sets.

“Well I had to do _something_ , David.” she says and turns off the tv, “Rewatching just the ending of a Romantic Comedy is like so _tragic_. Even for you.” 

“Well, what do you want me to do?” he gestures frantically to his empty room, “I am _suffering_. Professionally and romantically.” 

Alexis presses her lips together and examines her cuticles like the passive aggressive little b she is. “I thought you and Patrick weren’t a thing.” 

“We’re not!” He yells and rolls over face down onto his bed. “Fuck off.” he mutters into his pillows.

He hears Alexis laugh. “Ok, you know what I think we need David?” He glances over his shoulder to see a wicked glint in her eye, “I think we need like…a fun night out.” She adds a shimmy for effect. 

David groans and lets his face fall back on the bed. “Ok well I’m not really in the mood to do a ton of coke right now.”

Alexis huffs and sits down _on top of him_. “David no one’s ever ‘in the mood’ to do a ton of coke.” 

“Ok well I’m not leaving this apartment.” 

“Not even if I got us a reservation for tonight at _Le Bernardin_?” she asks lightly. He glances over at her and she gives him a double blink like she knows she just won. 

David pushes her off of him, “Ugh, _fine_. But you’re paying for the tasting menu _with_ the wine pairing.”

\--

“Oh my god, this tuna is _everything_. Nom nom for us, David!” 

David frowns at her over his own plate. “Ok, never say ‘nom nom’ again.” 

Alexis takes another bite and moans in a way that makes David embarrassed to be sitting in public with her. “No, but this might be the best meal I’ve ever had. And I have like, Gordon Ramsay on speed dial.” 

David pushes his fish around his plate and huffs to stop the involuntary smile forming on his face. “The best meal I ever had was a five dollar pizza carried up a fire escape.” 

Alexis smiles knowingly and flicks her wrist at him, “Um, ok, David. I seriously _doubt_ that, but I love this cute little moment you’re having right now.” 

\--

He’s surprised when Wendy texts him, mostly because he thought she’d have taken out a restraining order by now. 

Sleek looks exactly the way it did two weeks ago, and it only offends David a little bit that the place is running about the same even though he’s no longer there.

He waves off Bree at the front desk and heads back to Wendy’s office. His desk in front is the way he left it - bereft and pristine. Personal belongings on a piece of furniture that has a functional purpose is incorrect. 

If Wendy’s schedule is still the same, she’s currently “on a call” so she can skip the weekly design meeting. He knocks on her open door hesitantly, checking to see if there’s anything in range that Wendy can throw at him.

Wendy has a lot of personal belongings on her desk, so that’s a yes.

She glances up and removes her glasses before waving him in. He hesitantly takes a seat in front of her desk and notices that she has new chairs, a new bar cart and a new bookcase in her office. Her framed 50th Anniversary issue is also notably absent. 

“Your new decor is nice.” he comments lightly and glances around.

Wendy looks around and nods, “Thank you. You never know when inspiration will strike. Besides, it was time to...redecorate.” 

David pretends that wasn’t directed at him and starts nervously twisting the rings around his fingers, moving them into different combinations until they’re distributed evenly on both of his hands. “Wendy, I—” 

There are two ways he could go. He could throw Patrick under the bus and play the victim and kiss her ass until she gives him his job back. 

Or he could apologize.

He takes a deep breath, “I wanted to apologize.” he swallows and looks down at his hands, “What we did-what _I_ did, was wrong. On so many levels. I took advantage of your trust and put my personal wants above the needs of my job, so.” he glances back up at Wendy and forces himself to look her in the eye, “I’m...sorry.”

Wendy watches him for a while and eyes him in a way that makes David uncomfortable. The silence stretches on so long that David can feel the panic starting to bloom in his chest before Wendy eventually leans over and grabs a bottle of whiskey from her new bar cart and two glasses. 

She opens the bottle and starts pouring into one of the glasses when she says, “I decided to dress myself for the Letter from the Editor shoot this week,” she smiles grimly and slides the glass over to him, “I looked awful. It took them two hours to find something that works. It would’ve taken you minutes.”

David takes a sip, not sure what to say. Which is fine, because Wendy keeps going, “Also you missed it, I got the proofs from our astrology shoot and half of the models were wearing violet gowns and I lost my mind,” she laughs but David still doesn’t trust himself to engage, “I didn’t realize how much filtering you did before you let those come across my desk.”

She takes a sip from her own glass and sits back in her desk. “You broke my trust, so I can’t give you your job back.” she says and even though David knew it wasn’t a possibility, his stomach still sinks a bit, “But since you’ve been gone, I realized how much you actually did outside of your job description. And how undervalued you were here.” 

David’s heart rate picks up. “I understand completely. I wouldn’t hire me back either. But, thank you.” he takes a breath and takes another sip, “I know of some decent candidates, for a new assistant. More designed to what you actually need.” 

Wendy smiles, “I appreciate that.” She places her glass on her desk and picks up a sticky note, “This is for you.”

He expects it to say something like “Fuck Off”, but instead it says “Vogue - Wednesday at 10am”. 

David’s heart stops and he looks up at Wendy, “I don’t...what is this?” 

Wendy shrugs and crosses her arms, “Vogue is looking for a new fashion editor, and I may have made a call or two. You have an interview on Wednesday morning.” 

David feels pressure building behind his eyes and he breathes through his nose to try and lessen it. “Wendy, I can’t let you do this! I-I literally orchestrated a relationship for you like a producer on the Bachelor!”

Wendy nods, “You did. But, I didn’t _get_ you the job, I just got your name on the interview list. You actually have to get the job yourself. But I don’t doubt you will. You have so much talent David. It needs to be noticed and utilized.” she takes a sip and smirks, “Besides, maybe Anna Wintour can deal with you better than I could.”

David laughs wetly and discreetly wipes his eyes when Wendy refills her drink, “Wendy, I...thank you. I don’t know how to thank you.” 

Wendy smiles, “Well, you could start by explaining your shoot cataloguing system.” 

David nods, “That I can do.” 

Once he makes it back onto the street outside of the building he takes a giant fucking breath and pulls out his phone. 

He doesn’t realize he’s pulled up Patrick’s messages until he’s staring at the last one he sent last week: _I’m so sorry_

He feels like someone’s just knocked the wind out of him. He just got virtually life changing news, and Patrick was the person he wanted to call first. 

He stops by one of the hot dog carts on his walk home because he needs to contemplate. Is he in love with Patrick? Obviously he was attracted to him and there were (are)... _feelings_ there. But are those feelings _love_? What is love even supposed to feel like? The last time he felt something remotely close to the emotion was at a Mariah Carey concert a few years ago.

David cringes when he thinks about his words from last week. Those aren’t words you say to someone you... _care_ about. David knows deep down that Patrick was right—David got himself fired. But Patrick came to apologize anyway, because that’s who he is and David bit his head off— _of course_ that’s when David realizes he has feelings for him. 

He should’ve gotten another hot dog. 

Stevie is sitting on the couch when he gets home. “Am I in love with Patrick?” he asks in lieu of a greeting. 

Stevie snorts, “Oh my fucking _god_.” and throws a pillow at him. “Yes, dumbass, you are.” 

David falls onto the couch and groans, “What am I going to do? The last time I saw him I told him he might have no talent and basically chased him out of the apartment! He’s not gonna want to talk to me! I mean he hasn’t even texted me since!” 

Stevie levels him with a stare, “This might be a crazy idea,” she says drily, “but you could call him.”

David gestures wildly, “And say _what_?” 

Stevie shrugs. “I don’t know. Maybe that you’re sorry?” 

David fidgets with the hem of his sweater. “I don’t think it’ll be enough.” 

Stevie comes over and sits next to him. “You’ll never know if you don’t try.” she nudges him with her shoulder and he looks up at her, “I still like this for you, you know. And you know that I mean it because I’m incapable of faking sincerity.” 

David nods, “You’re also just incapable of sincerity.” Stevie rolls her eyes and thumps him with a nearby pillow before going back to scrolling through her phone. 

David stares at his phone for a minute before going into his room and closing the door. He doesn’t trust Stevie not to yell things in the background (like the troll she is) and he needs this conversation to go well. 

He dials Patrick and it immediately goes to voicemail. David balks– is this what happens when someone blocks your number? He hangs up before the beep because what would that message even be? _Hi, it’s David. Sorry about throwing you out of my apartment after telling you that you had no writing skill but call me back I have feelings for you._

No, he needs to do this in person. He just needs to find the right moment. 

Little does he know he’ll get that moment a few days later when he gets a text from Ronnie.

\--

_“So what happened after he climbed up the tower and rescued her?”_

_“She rescues him right back.”_

Patrick has stopped counting the amount of times he’s watched Pretty Woman because it’s reached an embarrassing number. 

He shrinks back into the couch and contemplates restarting the movie from the beginning. Rachel is staying at Andrew’s this week so he has the apartment to himself, which means there’s no one here to judge him in his current state. 

He rewinds the movie. But he only goes back about halfway, because he’s not in the mood to watch those awful shop women be mean to Julia Roberts right now.

For someone who hadn’t seen this movie all the way through a week ago, he could probably quote it by heart now. 

He laughs when he makes it to the part where Richard Gere gives Julia Roberts the necklace and closes it on her hand. David was right, it’s really funny. 

_David._ Patrick groans and rolls over to smother his face into the couch cushion while he lets David’s words replay in his mind: 

_“I think you’d rather run around and be Ronnie’s personal chew toy than actually write something and figure out you’ve wasted your time because you were right and you lost any skill you had.”_

He was probably right. No, he was definitely right. Patrick can’t really remember the last time he even looked at the draft for his story. If you could even call a blank document a draft. Could he still call himself a writer if he hasn’t written anything yet? 

He shifts his face on the couch so he can watch the movie through one eye and makes an executive decision. 

He’s a take charge kind of guy, so he’s going to take charge of his current situation. He is _going to get up and go outside—_ maybe on a hike—and he is _going to start writing_ _his article_ and he’s _going to stop feeling sorry for himself_.

Tomorrow though. Right now he needs to finish this movie. 

\--

The next day he takes the 1 all the way to the end and makes his way to Van Cortlandt Park. He’s very familiar with the John Muir trail at this point and makes his way through his usual path.

There’s no one really around so he watches his shoes crunch around on the ground, watching the dirt drag underneath them. He looks at his shoes and smiles softly. David would hate these shoes. He can practically hear David saying how ‘incorrect’ they are.

Patrick huffs and adjusts his backpack and keeps going. He’s been on this hike quite a few times in the past month, trying to work through his thoughts. A lot of them have been about David. 

Patrick knows he has feelings for David. Like some very deep, intense feelings that he can’t quite name. The back of his brain supplies the name very easily and Patrick has to take a break because he's feeling _very_ overwhelmed.

The rational part of him knows he loves David. Patrick doesn’t think he’s been exactly subtle about it. But still. He isn’t in a place where he could say it, and if he can’t say it he knows David definitely isn’t in a place to hear it. 

Well, assuming that David ever wants to talk to him again. He did push him over the edge the last time they spoke.

Patrick wants to be mad at David for what he said because it was really fucking mean, and it hurt. 

But it only hurt because it was true, so he’s not actually mad at David. At least, not anymore. Mostly he just misses him. 

He thinks about texting him, but David’s lack of responses have proven that he doesn’t want to hear from Patrick, so he needs to give him some space.

He sits on the ground with his back up against a tree and pulls out his notebook. He flips through the notes he has and tries to start on an initial outline. He writes down all of the logistics of the gerilympics and then glances back at all of the stories he has and tries to find places for them in between. 

By the time his ass is really starting to hurt from sitting down too long two hours have passed and not only has he outlined the entire outline but he has a good portion of the introduction written out.

Maybe he _can_ do this.

\--

He absolutely _cannot_ do this. 

He looks at what he’s written and they might be the worst four pages ever written _ever_. He grabs one of the blankets from where it is on the couch behind him and throws it over himself, enshrouding himself in his shame and suckiness. 

He hears the door open and Rachel’s voice filters through the blanket void he’s created. “Oh my god, Patty we should’ve at least toured one wedding venue before we broke off our engagement because did you know that not only do you get free food you get free booze? And honestly I may never pick a wedding venue because I—oh no.”

He feels the blanket being pulled off and is suddenly met with Rachel’s concerned face. “Patrick what happened? This place looks like one of those display rooms at IKEA.” 

Patrick may have gotten a little overzealous with the vacuum and clorox during one of his (many) breaks this morning. 

Rachel is still frowning at him, “Why are you here? Shouldn’t you be at work?”

He laughs and his breath hitches because he honestly thinks he’s finally ready to cry about this. He drops his head back onto the couch and rubs his hands over his eyes, brushing away the tears that have already formed. “I got fired.” 

Rachel’s mouth drops open and then suddenly she grins, “Patrick! That’s amazing! We _have_ to celebrate—you’re finally free!” Patrick sucks in a breath and doesn’t even try to hide the fact that he’s crying now (and treading into weeping territory), but Rachel’s seen him in worse moods. She sighs and pulls at his shoulders until he’s upright and then forces him into a hug, “Oh, Patty.” 

He sniffles and tucks his head into his shoulder, “I-I spent so much time at that magazine, and I never wrote a single thing. And now I’ve ruined everything. A-And David hates me, and Ronnie hates me even more than she did before so now she’ll really never help me and—” he breaks away to wipe his face on the sleeve of his sweater.

“I am so bad at this. Like I _suck_ at this, Rach. I’ve been trying to write the same article for months and it’s so bad I can’t even finish it!” he throws the blanket over his head again.

He hears Rachel sigh and she’s pulling off the blanket so he thinks she’s going to hug him again, but instead she hits him with a pillow, _hard._

“Ow!” he says and she keeps smacking him with the pillow, “Rach, stop!” 

She finally drops the pillow and huffs, “Of course your first draft sucks! It’s a first draft, it’s _supposed_ to suck! But you know what you do? You go back and you edit it. And you keep editing it until it’s better. But you _can’t edit anything you haven’t written yet_!” 

She hits him with the pillow one more time for good measure. “You’re not a bad writer _yet_. You need to stop wallowing and just write something that sucks! Yes, Ronnie might have been mean to you, but you learned so much from her! You just never had the time to do anything with it, and now you do.” she flips the pillow around and hands it to him, “So _go do it_.” 

He grabs the pillow and eyes her warily, “Your methods leave something to be desired, but still. Thank you. I needed that.” 

Rachel smiles and shoves his shoulder affectionately, “You’re welcome. Now do you need a David pep talk too, or can that wait?” 

Patrick grins and stands up, grabbing his laptop, “It can wait. Right now I have to write the world’s most terrible first draft.” 

Rachel high fives him, “I’m proud of you.” 

Patrick grins and heads into his room, “I’m not coming out of here until I have a draft.” 

Patrick takes a break a few hours later to turn his phone back on and check his LinkedIn for any responses to his resume when he sees he has a missed call from David. 

His heartbeat quickens when he clicks on the notification but then returns to normal when he sees David didn’t leave a voicemail. It was probably just a butt dial or something. 

\--

Patrick goes in on a Saturday to finally clean out his desk, because it’s the one day a week he knows Ronnie won’t want to be in the office.

It’s like someone above just lives to fuck with him because as soon as he rounds the corner he sees Ronnie walking down the hall. 

She stops when she sees him. “Oh good, you’re here. I can’t find the piece on lesbian soccer players in Nigeria.” 

Patrick grips the corners of the box he brought. “It’s probably in your recycle bin.”

Ronnie nods, “And I can’t find Miguel’s email contact anywhere.” 

Patrick shifts uncomfortably, “You had me change it to ‘Gossip Columnist’.” 

Ronnie nods again and looks around like she’s working up to something. “Thanks. Also, I need you to come back to work.”

Patrick freezes and doesn’t know what to say. Of all of the things he expected Ronnie to say to him, this didn’t even make the list. “...what?” 

Ronnie steps closer to him and crosses her arms, “You crossed every personal boundary imaginable. I considered setting you up for a white collar crime just so I could watch you get arrested. But,” she pauses and Patrick is still holding his breath, “you did tell me the truth when it mattered, and you owned up to it. And if this whole situation had happened to literally anyone else, I would’ve admired the ruthless ambition. It was surprisingly smart—I mean, you aren’t an unintelligible person by any means. Somehow you kept this place running. It’s practically falling apart without you.” 

Patrick lets out the breath he was holding and laughs, “Ronnie you don’t know what that means...I learned so much from you here. And I know you don’t like me, but you’re kind of my hero.” he pauses and glances back down at the box in his hands before looking back up, “But if I actually want to be a writer, I need to actually start writing and stop looking for reasons not to. So I can’t be your assistant.” 

Ronnie huffs, and there’s just a glimmer of something in her eye—maybe respect? “It’s just like you, Brewer, to leave me in the lurch like this.”

“You _fired_ me!”

She rolls her eyes, “So have you actually written anything yet?”

Patrick nods and pulls the folder out of the box. “Yeah, I have. Um, here.” 

She takes the folder and smirks, “We can go over it, I guess.” 

He follows her back to her office and tries to keep his face composed while she reads over her article even though he feels like he’s going to pass out. At some point she reaches over and grabs a red pen and every time she crosses something out Patrick’s pulse picks up.

After what feels like forever she looks up at him and puts the article down. She stares at him for a moment before saying, “Not bad. Your stories jump the gun in some places and your grammar leaves something to be desired...but it has good bones.” 

If it didn’t cross like a hundred different boundaries Patrick would hug her right now. 

Ronnie leans back in her chair, “I think after some editing, you might have something. I’m not going to do it of course, because I will _not_ be publishing anything of yours,” and Patrick bites back a grin, because it’s just so _Ronnie_ , “but I’m gonna connect you with a guy I know at Sports Illustrated.” 

She reaches into the top drawer of her desk and pulls out a business card. “Call him on Monday. Consider it a going away gift.” 

Patrick takes the card and swallows the lump in his throat. “I don’t know what to say. Thank you, Ronnie.” 

Ronnie waves him off. “You’re right, I don’t really like you Brewer. You care too much what people think of you and you have the unearned confidence of a golden retriever. But, you did save me from a potentially awful mistake— _that you caused—_ but still. Thank you.”

Patrick’s stomach sinks, “Oh are you and Wendy not together anymore? I’m so sorry.”

Ronnie shrugs, “We went on another few dates just to spite the two of you and prove that we didn’t need you two to work, but it turns out we did. It worked out in the end, I guess. I ended up sending Wendy so many flowers while we were together that I got to know the florist really well.” 

Patrick smiles, “Oh that’s great! It’s always great to meet a good florist for future events and—” 

“No, when I saw I got to know the florist, I got to _know_ the florist.” Ronnie says and Patrick flushes. _Oh._ “So something good came out of this after all. But just so we’re clear,” she pauses and levels Patrick with a stare that makes him nervous, “out of the two of us, I’m not the one who needs help with my love life.” 

Patrick clears his throat, “Noted. Um, thank you. For the notes. And for...well, everything.” 

Ronnie nods, “You’re welcome. Now get out of my office and _enjoy_ the rest of her day.” There’s something in her tone that Patrick can’t really decipher, but he leaves it and heads off to clear out his desk. 

\--

David paces in front of the building and is just about to break his cardinal rule of not tugging on his sweater sleeves when he sees Patrick walk out of the building, a cardboard box of things in his hands. 

He sees David and freezes where he is before walking over and looking up at David with his very loud, very sad (and maybe a little...hopeful?) eyes, “...hi.” he says and adjusts the box in his hands.

“Hi.” is all that David can manage to say back because he can’t focus over how fast his heart is beating. 

“What are you doing here?” 

David glances towards the building, “Um. Ronnie asked me to meet her here. Why are you here?”

Patrick looks confused for a minute before something clicks in his mind and he snorts, “Oh my _god_.” 

David tilts his head, “What are you... _oh_.” the same light goes off in David’s brain, “She set us up. Funny.” 

Patrick smiles tightly and glances around. “Um. It’s good to see you, David. I hope you’re doing well. Maybe, um...maybe I’ll see you around, somewhere, in the future?” he offers lamely and David really doesn’t want him to go—he _needs_ him not to go. He got the opportunity he wanted and he can _not_ fuck it up.

But Patrick gives a little half wave and turns to leave anyway like he can’t hear David’s internal monologue and before he can think about it David blurts out, “I work at Vogue!” which makes Patrick turn around and stare at him confusedly, so David tries again, “Um, Vogue was looking for a new fashion editor and Wendy got me an interview and...I got it.” 

Patrick’s lips turn down into a huge grin, “David! That’s...that’s amazing. Congratulations.”

David gives him a weak smile and takes a deep breath while he tries to turn the thoughts in his head into words out loud. Ugh, Billy Crystal made this off-the-cuff romantic declaration look so much easier than it actually was. 

“Thank you.” David bites his lip and chews on the words swirling around in his mind before he continues, “I got the job yesterday and I can’t even begin to wrap my mind around it just yet. But um, when I got it...you were the first person I wanted to call. But I couldn’t—I _didn’t_. And that’s um, that’s my fault.” 

“No it was definitely my fault, David.”

“It was mostly my fault.”

“Only because it was my fault in the first place!” 

“Ok, maybe we can just agree that it was mutually both of our faults? Because I’m kind of gearing up towards this whole love declaration so if you could just—”

“You love me?” 

“Ok, _no_. That’s just like...what it’s universally called in the world of romcoms. Like that’s the terminology—but I don’t, I mean, um.” David takes a deep breath, “I fucked up, Patrick. I was mean, and I pushed you away and I don’t blame you for staying away. But um, I miss you. I miss eating pizza with you and I miss you making fun of my sweaters and I miss the way you look at me. I didn’t realize that you...saw me until you stopped.” he clears his throat because he needs to get through this without crying, “I just...I really really _really_ like you Patrick. And I need you to know that. Even if you don’t feel the same way, I just. I can’t leave without you knowing that.”

Patrick’s grin looks like it’s going to split his face open and his eyes are really shiny and loud when he says, “ _David_.” like it’s an answer to something that he was looking for, “I really really _really_ like you too.” He takes a breath and David can feel the snarky comment that’s about to come out of his mouth and he’s honestly never been so excited to be made fun of in his life, “Even though you’ve been known to steal someone’s dinner.” 

David rolls his eyes. “Ok was it ever your dinner if you didn’t pay the delivery guy?” 

Patrick bites his lip, “And you wear leather jackets to baseball games in the middle of summer.” 

“Well, I’m not gonna apologize for having great fashion sense.” 

He notices Patrick has a glint in his eye and his grin has turned into a teasing smirk and _oh_. David gets it. “Yeah well, you wear those weird rubber things on your fingers to flip pages faster even though they don’t flip pages faster.” He says and levels Patrick with a stare.

“You’re a sore winner.” 

“For someone so competitive you are _awful_ at beer pong.” 

“I once saw you pull a jar of pretzels out of the garbage and continue to eat them.”

“You dance like your legs are actual tree trunks.” 

Patrick puts his box on the sidewalk and steps closer and David’s heart is hammering in his chest. “ _And yet_.” 

David puts his hands on his shoulders and pulls him the rest of the way so he can memorize the smile on Patrick’s face. This face likes him. “ _And yet_.”

Patrick winds his arms around David’s waist and his eyes flicker down to his lips and that’s all the signal David needs before he finally leans down and kisses him. 

Kissing Patrick is everything he imagined it would be and nothing like he imagined it would be at the same time. His lips are soft and his touch is so gentle—like David is something precious and worth holding—that David might actually cry in public (which is usually _very_ incorrect, but this is an exception). 

Patrick pulls away slightly and David can feel his smile more than he can see it. “So do you want to get pizza?”

Instead of tucking his smile into the corner of his mouth like he usually does, he lets it go free. “I could do a slice. You have to carry it up my fire escape, though.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm on Tumblr, come say [hi](https://lilythesilly.tumblr.com)!


	5. Epilogue

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A cute little glimpse into the future...

Patrick walks through the glass doors at Vogue and sees David’s assistant, Mandy, already waiting for him at the reception desk.

Patrick gapes at her, “How did he know I was coming? _I_ didn’t even know I was coming.”

Mandy laughs. “I always have security ping me when you sign in. Come on I’ll take you back.”

Patrick follows her through the rows of desks until they reach David’s office. “You’re honestly the best, Mandy.” He holds out one of the bags in his hand, “You want a scone?”

Mandy preens and grabs the bag from him, “Thanks.”

David is pouring over a photo spread and looks annoyed when he raps on the open door. He looks up at the noise and Patrick is just able to catch the smile that appears on his face before he tries to tuck it back into the corner of his mouth.

Patrick leans on the door and holds up the tray in his hand. “Long day?”

David grunts and stares back at his desk. “You could say that. Do you have an opinion on mermaid silhouettes?”

Patrick laughs and walks over to his desk, glancing at the photos that are spread out, “Not one that you haven’t already instilled in me.” he says, kissing David quickly before handing him his coffee and the other paper bag.

David accepts it with a little shimmy, “Coffee _and_ a muffin? It’s not my birthday.” he says and pulls out the muffin so he can take a bite, “You must be avoiding your rewrite.”

“I am _not_.” Patrick says and takes a sip of his tea, and well, “Ok, I’m not _not_ avoiding it. I had something to pick up at FedEx.”

“Ooh, and is this something for me?” David leans forward expectantly.

“I doubt it. Unless you want the copy of A-Rod’s new book…?”

David makes a face, "As fun as that sounds, I think I'll pass." he says and then adds, "That being said, please highlight any and all parts about JLo." before going back to looking through the photos on his desk. Patrick laughs, but doesn’t tell him about the _other_ package he picked up—the long velvet black box that holds four gold rings similar to the silver ones David is wearing right now.

David takes a sip of his coffee and nods in approval, like after two years Patrick wouldn’t have his coffee order memorized. “I have a couple meetings this afternoon, but I can wrap up around five if you want to get dinner later?”

Patrick hums. “Can’t pull late nights like you used to? I’ve heard that happens when you’re older.”

David glares at him. “I am only 30, you brat.”

Patrick nods solemnly and tries not to laugh. “Tell me, what’s it like on the other side, David? I wouldn’t know, I’m still in my mid-twenties.”

David scoffs, “You are definitely in your very _late_ twenties, so I would stop teasing before you get ahead of yourself.”

Patrick laughs and hooks his chin over David’s shoulder, in that space that seems like it was made just for him. He wraps his arms around David’s waist to pull him closer and David instinctively leans over to press a quick kiss to the corner of his mouth before going back to what he was doing.

He could stay here, like this with David forever. ‘Forever’ settles into his chest like a fact now, instead of when they first started dating and it was all purely hope. He’s gonna spend forever with David Rose.

For now, he does have to get back to his own office. But. “If I promised there would be wine and cheese at the end,” he says lightly and presses a kiss to his favorite spot on David’s neck, just under his ear, “would you go on a hike with me this weekend?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I think we all know what happens next 😉
> 
> I'm on Tumblr, come say [hi](https://lilythesilly.tumblr.com)!


End file.
